Power Rangers: 2010
by Pink Wolf Princess
Summary: A special author's note inside.
1. Chapter 1: Once a Ranger Always a Ranger

HAPPY FIRST ANNIVERSARY TO ME!

That's right, you people have been forced to endure my rambles and fluff and chaos for a year now. I feel sorry for you- but not sorry enough! And here is the beginning of my anniversary fic. It's going to be epic! And now I have published a score of fanfics. Dude.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Power Rangers or anything related to Power Rangers. Wait, not true. A have a PRMM movie DVD, a Red Ranger finger puppet, a Pink Ranger glove, a PRMM sticker sheet, and a small group of Power Ranger action figures. And tons of PR-related plot bunnies. But that's all.

I don't own the Brady Bunch either. That wasn't random. There are also 3 OCs in here.

* * *

**Chapter One: Once a Ranger, Always a Ranger**

Three people were in the control room of the rebuilt Dino Lair which stretched out underground between the house of Dr. Thomas Oliver and the business owned by Hayley Ziktor in the city of Reefside. Two of the aforementioned trio were those two people. Dr. Thomas Oliver was a man with short, gelled dark brown hair, fair skin, and dark brown eyes framed by glasses. He wore a green T-shirt and black pants. Hayley Ziktor was a pretty redheaded woman with pale skin and intelligent eyes wearing dangly amethyst earrings to go with her royal purple dress and shoes. They were sitting in swivel chairs at a computer consul, studying video images, charts of energy flows, and there was an unfinished game of solitaire in the corner of Thomas Oliver's screen.

"So? What's the verdict?" asked the third person. He had cropped black hair, pale skin, almond eyes, and looked to be about the same age of the other two- late twenties to early thirties. He wore a black T-shirt under a green V-neck sweater and black jeans. He looked back and forth between the pair. "Should we call in the others? Tommy? Hayley?"

"Hard to say," admitted Hayley. "Ivan Ooze, after his escape from that construction site last week, hasn't done much of anything we can tell once he got to the moon fortress."

"Yeah, but look at all that dark energy radiation exuding from the moon fortress," argued Thomas, or Tommy. "He's clearly getting ready to do something- something big."

"Should we can in some others then? And if we do- who?"

"Whom, Adam," Hayley absently corrected him, reading some reports. "Great. I think you're right, Tommy. These dark power readings… they're off the charts."

"This is serious," Tommy frowned, fiddling with his wire frame glasses which he didn't need but wore anyway to look more 'scholarly'. "That chart can take up to some serious evil… it's never been off the charts before that I can remember."

"That's not saying much though," Adam observed. Tommy just threw a nearby book at the other man, who easily caught it. "Huh. _Computers for Beginners_- not yours, I take it, Hayley?"

"Nope."

Tommy just sighed and tried to change the subject. "I think we need Jason's input. He was chosen to be the first Red Power Ranger for a reason, after all."

"Yeah," nodded Adam just as two sets of footsteps could be heard on the stairs. All three turned their heads to greet the pair of newcomers. One was a stocky, short, and shiny robot in primary colors and gold plating. The other had the appearance of a very young man despite the slight goatee he had. He had floppy brown hair with two streaks of almost white hair framing his quiet face with its serious dark eyes. There was a fresh red scratch on one cheek, marring his moon-pale skin. He wore a dirty white T-shirt and khaki pants. Tommy greeted him first.

"How are you holding up, Merrick?"

He shrugged uneasily as he leaned against the wall, crossing his arms across his chest. "Not bad. Any news on Ivan?"

"No news isn't good news in this case," Hayley informed him.

"Ai ai ai!" exclaimed the robot. Adam hurried to assure him, "It'll work out in the end, Alpha, like it always does."

"I hope so, Adam," the robot responded worriedly, its hands to its disc-like head. "Should we contact some of the other Rangers once we get news?"

Tommy rubbed the back of his neck. "I think we should call Jason now. We need him."

Merrick shifted slightly.

"We do," Adam told Merrick. "He has seniority over all of us here. Besides, Jason always has had a head for strategy."

"I'll send him an e-mail," Hayley told the guys. "Today at six sound good?"

The three men nodded, so Hayley quickly typed and sent the e-mail before leaning back in her chair.

"Why do I have the feeling we're getting in over our heads?"

No one answered her.

At five minutes until six Tommy heard a van pull into the driveway. Stepping out onto the front porch of his two-story beige house he watched the red minivan come to a halt. A sturdy man with black hair and fair skin got out of the driver's seat. He wore a red long-sleeved shirt and a pair of jeans. Sliding open the secondary door a trio of children came out. The oldest looked to be eight and was the only boy, with his father's dark hair but with bright blue eyes. He wore a brown shirt and jeans. The younger two, both girls, looked to be about six and four. The six-year-old had blond hair but her father's brown eyes, and wore a red T-shirt and a pair of overalls. The four-year-old wore a lavender poufy dress-up dress and had the same hair and eyes as her father.

Tommy waved at the quartet. "Jason! Glad you could make it. Hey, Micah, Ruby, and Aurora! How are my favorite godchildren?"

"We're your only godchildren," giggled little Aurora, waving her pretend wand capped by a gold tin-foil star at him. "Poof! Now you're a friendly dragon, Uncle Tommy."

"Am I? Well, then I'll kidnap the princess," he laughed, scooping up the approaching girl. Jason watched on with amusement as Tommy spun around the laughing young girl. Ruby shook her head at the pair.

"I wasn't that silly when I was her age."

"That was just two years ago. Besides, you're both girls," Micah snorted. Ruby just tackled him. Jason hurriedly worked to separate the fighting pair. Watching on, Tommy and Aurora just exchanged sober headshakes.

"Cut it out! Micah, stop teasing your sister. Ruby, stop beating up your brother."

"He called me a girl!"

"You are a girl!"

Jason sighed at his best friend of seventeen years. "See why Emily made me take them with me?"

Tommy just grinned lopsidedly. "Come on, everyone else is inside. I ordered pizza for dinner."

"YAY!" yelled all three kids. Loyally Ruby added, "But it won't be as good as JKP's."

"It's still pizza," Micah rolled his eyes. Jason sighed, "Behave!"

Tommy hugged little Aurora to him. "Am I still a dragon?"

She lightly tapped him on the head with her wand. "Now you're not."

"Let's go inside then."

Sitting around the kitchen table with the pizza boxes almost empty Hayley commented, "We wanted to talk to you after dinner, Jason."

"I know."

Adam and Merrick exchanged slightly anxious looks at his flat tone. Jason gently tousled his son's hair as Micah finished his third piece of pizza. "You three can play in the living room while we talk."

"I'm eight! I'm old enough to stay."

"If he can stay I can stay!"

"Could we have a tea party?"

Merrick stood up, empty plate in hand. "I'll play with you guys if you want."

Micah and Ruby looked at one another. Deciding that if an adult got to come with them it didn't count as being excluded they chorused, "Okay."

"Tea party!" proclaimed Aurora, bouncing up and down. Merrick looked over at the other two. "Shouldn't you check that your siblings want a tea party?"

Ruby waved a hand dismissively. "We have tea parties with her all the time."

Micah nodded as the quartet left the kitchen. "Yeah, and sometimes we have soda parties instead."

Jason smiled after his kids. Turning to face Tommy, Adam, and Hayley he stated, "I thought we agreed: no more unneeded Ranger activity. You three are bachelors-"

"Ahem."

"And a bachelorette," he amended. "I have a family, guys. I can't go off and play at saving the world like you guys still do."

"It's **not** playing- ow!"

Tommy had kicked Adam under the table.

"I get that, Jason. But we think this time it's for real. About a week ago Adam got some bad vibes coming from a construction site in Angel Grove. Remember? It had been started but stopped fast some time late in the Mighty Morphin era… about the time Adam, the others, and I got the Ninjetti powers. Recently it had been refunded and resumed."

"All right. And?"

"When I got there, there was a giant egg, opened up. It was empty only because what had been contained in it had already escaped," Adam informed the other man, both subconsciously rubbing at the communicators on their left wrists. "A villain named Ivan Ooze. He said something about being unhappy because he had missed the Spanish Inquisition and the Brady Brunch reunion before blowing out a wad of snot."

"Snot?"

"That then turned into a group of Tenga Warriors," Tommy explained, starting to finger his own communicator. "Adam had to activate his morpher to beat them, and then engaged in battle with Ivan Ooze."

Adam sighed at the memory. "He beat me in the end. I was on the ground, demorphed, with him about to land the final blow when Merrick roared up on his motorcycle."

Clearly both had survived the encounter but Jason was still anxious. "And?"

"It was close, especially since Merrick can't turn into the Lunar Wolf Ranger still. But he held him off long enough for Adam to regroup and remorph into the Black Power Ranger," Hayley reported. "Together they managed to fend off Ivan Ooze, but he literally slipped away. When I found him via my computer systems, he had managed to get to the ruins of the moon fortress."

"What is he doing there?" a surprised Jason asked. The other three looked at one another nervously. Finally Tommy admitted, "We don't really know, Jason. But we're getting nervous. From what we've found, Zordon and another group of teenagers who used some power source other than the Power Coins managed to seal him away in that egg roughly seven thousand years ago because he tried to add Earth to his intergalactic empire."

Jason looked at the other three's troubled faces. "How powerful is he?"  
"Powerful enough that after just an hour or so of freedom he can nearly beat me and Merrick," Adam noted. Hayley looked away. "I think he might be a sorcerer of some sort as well… that could lead to him reanimating some old 'friends' of ours and the other teams'."

Tommy whistled. "So that's what you think Ivan is doing up there."

"It makes sense; with each new villain the power levels would spike; and even Ivan alone probably has high power levels," Hayley pointed out. "He most likely wants revenge on Earth and Zordon- failing that, which he will since Zordon died, Zordon's students."

Jason looked over his shoulder towards the living room. More than when he was a 'real' Ranger he knew the stakes. He looked back at his friends. Truth be told, he was jealous of Tommy, Adam, and Merrick; getting to go out and find monsters to battle and ensure the world was in extra good hands. He nodded once.

"I'm in. Once a Ranger, always a Ranger I suppose."

The other three smiled in relief. Jason couldn't help but smile back.


	2. Chapter 2: Triwolf Industries

I forgot to add last time: save for "The Tardy Present", this fic isn't in the same world as my other fics, for better or for worse. It also treats the MM movie as non-canon but I think the Turbo movie IS canon so there might be a reference or two to that.

Power Rangers and Harry Potter and NCIS aren't mine, but I am celebrating my first anniversary! Yay!

* * *

**Chapter Two: Triwolf Industries**

The next day found Jason, Tommy, and Adam in the apartment Adam lived in above his dojo in Angel Grove. Hayley and Merrick were back in Reefside while Jason's kids were at school in Ocean Bluff. Alpha 6 was hibernating upstairs while the three Rangers had breakfast. Adam had made them all fried rice and vegetables; neither Jason nor Tommy had complained although both had gotten out spoons instead of using chopsticks like Adam.

"So we're going to go visit the resident Ranger genius?" Tommy asked. Jason smiled one-sidedly. "Like we could manage it without him."

"We haven't heard from him in a while though," Adam noted. When the two more senior Rangers looked askance at him he modified his comment, saying, "From him personally. What if he's like Jason, except worse, and won't be convinced to return to action?"

"You guys did not convince me!" Jason retorted. Then, uncertainly he added, "Did you?"

"Nah," Tommy and Adam replied after exchanging a look- just to make sure they hadn't.

"Good. Look, Adam, remember who we're talking about here."

"That is true…"

The rest of breakfast was spent in silence. Then the trio walked through the mellow city streets until they came to a large steel blue building that commanded the surrounding area.

Adam whistled, sticking his hands into his black sports jacket (the same one he wore during his time in San Angeles). "We are not going to be able to slip in unnoticed."

In addition to the jacket Adam was wearing jeans and a forest green T-shirt. Jason was wearing a Gryffindor sweater and black slacks while Tommy wore a tie-dyed long-sleeved T-shirt (really? which colors?) with khaki pants. He had forgotten the glasses on the coffee table.

"Surely he won't mind seeing some old high school friends… especially us," Jason refuted, eying the large sign on the slight lawn in front of the building.

Triwolf Industries.

"Considering the name I think Jason has a point," Tommy agreed. So the three entered the main lobby of the building, which had a soaring ceiling and spartan furnishing with a blue theme. Towards the back was a desk guarding the three sets of elevators and a man in a suit guarding the desk. Jason confidently walked towards the desk, the other two following him.

"Hello. Is Mr. Cranston in?"

"Yes, but you can't get in without an appointment," the man replied simply, his eyes never leaving the computer screen as he typed. Tommy tried to peer over the desk to look at the screen but the man scowled at him so he backed off a bit. Jason told the man, "Look, just tell him that Jason, Tommy, and Adam are here."

Opening his mouth to say something clearly along the lines of 'please leave now' the man was silenced by a ringing phone. Picking it up he listened for a bit, then said 'yes, sir' repeatedly. As he hung up the man said, "Mr. Cranston is aware of your presence and wants to see you in his office."

Tommy and Adam exchanged a high-five. Jason just sighed. "Come on. Let's go."

Somewhat grumpily the man let the trio past the desk and into the central elevator, telling him that Mr. Cranston's office was on the top floor. Waving good-bye as the elevator doors closed the three men grew serious as the elevator rose upwards.

The elevator doors opened to a spacious office with cyan walls with wooden bookshelves packed full of books and technology and a back wall completely made of glass. Leaning back in an austere chair behind a desk with papers and technology organized on it was the CEO of Triwolf Industries, William Cranston.

Or Billy to his friends and teammates, which the trio were.

"Hey, Billy," Jason grinned. The golden-haired man grinned back. "Jason, Tommy, Adam. What brings you here?"

"Spandex," Tommy needled his friend. Billy, dressed in a blue suit with a navy tie, glowered at his friend. "It is NOT spandex."

"Right," the other three chorused innocently. Billy sighed, "Do you want my help or not?"

"We didn't say anything," Adam protested, shifting his feet sheepishly. Billy barked out a laugh, his blue eyes flashing with amusement.

"You didn't have to. When three of the most powerful, most senior Power Rangers decide to call on my office unannounced I don't need to be a genius to tell that's something's up. Especially as Jason has tried to distance himself from Ranger activity in the past. If he's been talked into whatever you two are up to now it must be big."

"We aren't up to anything; Ivan Ooze on the other hand," Tommy trailed off meaningfully. Billy raised his eyebrows pensively.

"I thought he had been sealed away 7000 years ago."

"Construction," Adam elaborated. Billy looked at the three-time Ranger warily. Tommy jabbed his friend in the ribs.

"Oof," Adam protested before taking the hint to explain further. "Due to some construction in Angel Grove the egg holding Ivan Ooze was uncovered and accidentally opened. So now he's in the moon fortress planning something big."

"What?"

"Uh…" the other three all looked at Billy guiltily. Billy closed his eyes and moved as if to push up his glasses before realizing he hadn't worn them in over ten years.

"You don't know what's going on but are already freaking out?"

"The dark power levels around the moon fortress are off the charts!" Tommy argued. "Clearly something is going on."

Billy had felt that something was brewing over the past few days. And now three of his old teammates were in his office, insisting on… what?

"And what exactly do you three want me to do?"

"Be the scary Wolf genius," Tommy suggested earnestly. Jason and Adam nodded. Placing his elbows on his desk Billy put his head in his hands.

"Why me Zordon? Why me?"

Then distant screaming could be heard on the streets below. Adam reached into his pocket and got out the Black Power morpher while Tommy pulled up his left sleeve slightly to reveal his Black Dino Holder. Jason looked over at Billy. Opening a drawer Billy got out the Red and Blue Power morphers, tossing the former to Jason while keeping the latter.

"Come on. Might as well get started."

"This time we can use all our powers, right?" Adam pressed his teammates. When he had used the Black Power morpher in 2007 he had restricted himself to his initial Ranger powers (i.e., none beyond the usual increased strength, speed, & durability while morphed). Jason replied simply, "I have a feeling we're going to need them."

Adam smiled as they teleported down to the street in flashes of color corresponding to their original colors: red for Jason, blue for Billy, green for Tommy, and black for Adam. To Adam's surprise he recognized the monsters wreaking havoc and their two squabbling leaders. He did a face-palm.

"Flurious? Moltor? Seriously?"

Jason eyed the icy Chillers and fiery Lava Lizards who were as prone to fighting each other as wreaking havoc. "And I thought Rita and Zedd didn't get along."

"No kidding," Tommy agreed, shifting into a karate position. "Morph or no?"

The other three looked at one another before concurring, "Morph."

"Tyrannosaurs!" called out Jason. Once morphed he proclaimed, "Red Power Ranger!"

"Triceratops!" Billy stated, just before morphing. "Blue Power Ranger."

"Dino Thunder, Power Up!" Tommy grinned as his fifth morpher revealed its true form on his wrist just before morphing into- "Black Dino Ranger!"

"Mastodon!" Adam shouted. Once morphed he declared, "Black Power Ranger!"

"I remember you," Flurious observed, pointing at the Black Power Ranger. "You will pay… if you and the others hadn't interfered no doubt I would have won in the end."

"You mean I would have won in the end," growled Moltor, getting out his broadsword. The Rangers were unsure whether the red lizard-like monster was going to use it on them or his icy brother. Flurious just rolled his eyes. The four Power Rangers got out their weapons as the Chillers and Lava Lizards began to notice them,

"Power Sword!"

"Power Lance!"

"Brachio Staff!"

"Power Axe!"

Mostly due to Billy, the Power Weapons had gotten an upgrade after he had repaired the Power Coins around the turn of the millennium. Basically they looked more high-tech and more intimidatingly powerful… both of which were true.

The quartet went into action, blowing up the frosty and fiery minions as they attached the Rangers. Swiftly Moltor lost his temper and charged into the fray with a battle cry. Wielding his Power Sword Jason halted the revived villain in his tracks. The two began a sword duel as Jason's teammates continued battling the minions. Spotting the encroaching ice onto the plaza stones Tommy warned the others, "Flurious is up to something."

"On it," Billy nodded, pointing his hand's palm at the villain. Arcs of lightening sprang out of his white Ranger glove and towards the surprised Flurious. With a cry he flew backwards as Adam brought down the Power Axe to shatter the layer of the ice coating the battlefield. Tommy used his fire strike on Chillers and his water strike on Lava Lizards. Splitting his Power Lance into two Billy noted that Tommy and Adam had the battle against the minions under control so he opted to head after the staggering Flurious.

The two blue-colored beings entered a fierce fight, evenly matched. Having defeated all the Chillers and Lava Lizards Tommy told Adam, "You go help Billy. I'll go help Jason."

"Right," Adam nodded before heading off. His Brachio Staff over a shoulder Tommy headed towards the battling Moltor and Jason. He called out, "Need any help, bro?"

Jason slashed at the scaled biped. "Maybe."

With a smile under his visor Tommy entered the fray. The two Rangers knew one another's battling styles inside and out, and Moltor found himself swiftly outmatched. Meanwhile Adam was trying to help Billy but the Blue Power Ranger was easily forcing back the pale villain. So Adam decided to get blunt and whacked Flurious on the icicles on his head with the flat side of the Power Axe.

"OW!" he exclaimed, taking a step back. "Come on, idiot brother of mine. Let's return to the moon fortress… for now."

And both disappeared. Jason decided, "Billy, can we go back to your office to talk some more?"

"Affirmative."

Just began they all teleported back to the office Adam muttered to himself, "I bet Ivan sent those two down to Earth to get rid of their squabbling for a bit."

All of them demorphed Billy led them into the adjoining room, which had a U-shaped blue plush couch and _more_ bookshelves crammed full of books and technology. There was also a fridge and a coffee-maker which Billy gestured to. "Do you guys want anything?"

"Caf-Pow?" Tommy asked hopefully. Billy smiled, "No caffeine here; otherwise I'd be hyper non-stop."

"You? Hyper?" Jason echoed dubiously.

Relaxing on the couch Adam observed, "We should get everyone together. If Ivan is already sending down monsters and minions things will get intense fast."

Jason nodded as Billy tossed him a can of root beer. "I need we need to get the first eighteen together- everyone who defended Angel Grove."

"Club Bulkmeir?" Tommy suggested, getting out his cell phone. Billy said, "I don't see why not. I think the Saturday after this one would work. That should give everyone time to get in the area."

"Uh… everyone?" flushed Adam. Tommy gulped slightly as the full impact of 'everyone' hit him as well. Jason groaned, but there was a wry smile at the edges of his mouth.

"Maybe you had stayed with Katherine, Tommy, and if you had ever gotten with Tanya, Adam, maybe you two wouldn't still play at being superheroes."

"It's not playing, Jason. They and Merrick have quelled a lot of problems over the decade," Billy intervened. "Jason, desist being petty."

Jason was unsure whether to look sheepish or annoyed, so he settled for an expression somewhere in between.

"So everyone from Jason to Zhane gets together on the Saturday after this one at Club Bulkmeir?" Tommy double-checked. The other three nodded. Billy added, "I'll work on getting all the morphers in battle-ready condition. Looks like all of them will see use eventually if today was any indication."

"True," Adam sighed. Tommy, looking through his list of phone numbers on his phone, commented, "I'll get Merrick to go see Eric and Taylor to alert them that they and the other in-between teams need to be on stand-by. Odds are we'll get on the news today so somehow I doubt we'll have to explain things to most of the junior teams. Adam and I can talk to most of the younger teams later."

"RJ, 2008's mentor and Violet Ranger, is my cousin so we're good there," Billy revealed, studying his unopened can of root beer as if he didn't know what it was.

"The SPD team of last year doesn't count though for that year's team, not really anyway," Jason frowned, sipping his can of root beer. Adam shifted uneasily. "I'm sure that it'll all work out in the end, just like it always does."

"Usually there's a cost though, when the stakes are this high," Tommy sighed, recalling his Dino Thunder days. The idea of seeing Katherine again had put him in a funk. Adam gave him a look of sympathy, experiencing a similar funk over Tanya.

"It'll be fine," Jason informed them. "We're the Power Rangers, after all."


	3. Chapter 3: Oh NO

Time for the third chapter! Poor Merrick and Mack is all I have to say. But alas, Merrick deserves it. Mack… not so much.

I do not own the Power Rangers. Lucky Haim Saban does. And CBS owns NCIS… I think. Well, I know I don't own NCIS- sniffle. I'm probably way off when the west coast gets to see NCIS but math is my weakest subject.

**Chapter Three: Oh NO**

Merrick was riding his motorcycle down a street in Silver Hills that Tuesday. He had never seen Taylor or Eric as the suburbia types but they had surprised him. The address Hayley had gotten for him was in a quiet, nice neighborhood with lawns and gardens and straight lines. It was kind of creeping him out. Plus it was already mid-afternoon; this was going to have to be a short visit he was going to get back to Reefside in time to watch NCIS at eight.

Ah, there it was. A beige house with a brown roof, and there was a red van in the driveway. Bright red, orange, and yellow flowers filled the flowerbeds, and Merrick had a feeling that they were the work of Danny. A pang in his heart made him twitch uneasily. He had cared about his teammates, which was why he had kept his distance. Plus they would have tried to get him with the Princess, which he couldn't dare hope for then and especially not now. Driving up into the driveway Merrick turned off his motorcycle and took off his helmet. He was dressed in a blue-grey T-shirt and jeans as well as his dark brown biking jacket.

In eleven days there would be a council at Club Bulkmeir on what to do about Ivan Ooze. Hopefully there'd be a verdict of repowering the morphers and fighting evil. Merrick missed having a purpose; without the Princess he felt rootless, a seed in the wind. But perhaps it was his own fault. With a shake of his head he got off his helmet and went up onto the porch.

Once he had knocked he shifted uneasily. What if no one was home, despite the car in the driveway? But a minute later the door opened to reveal Eric Myers, looking much as he had eight years ago when Merrick had first met him. Tall, with tawny skin and black hair, as well as hard brown eyes. He wore a red shirt, black slacks, and a wariness. Actually he probably usually wasn't as wary as he used to be, but finding your wife's long-lost teammate on your porch would put anyone's guard up.

"Merrick?" he asked in surprise. "What are you of all Rangers doing here?"

"Tommy asked me to," Merrick replied. Eric raised his eyebrows high. "Since when have you been in contact with Tommy Oliver?"

"2006," he shrugged simply. "Can I come in or should we discuss this on the porch?"

"No, come in. Taylor's on her way home; she called me about some minor emergency at the Air Force Base that has led to her coming home early," Eric explained as he led the other man through the house. "In other words, we ought to wait for her."

"Right," nodded Merrick seriously as they entered the kitchen. The room was clean but clearly often used. From what Eric had said it sounded like Taylor hadn't changed.

A young girl with Eric's tawny skin and black hair (albeit in two braided pigtails) stormed down the stairs, shouting, "Daddy! Ollie is teething on my stuffed animals AGAIN!"

"All right, Anna Maria. I'll be up in a minute," Eric sighed. "Keep Merrick company while I go deal with your brother."

Once Eric had left Anna Maria studied Merrick closely, and he took a closer look at her as well. She looked just about old enough to head off to school, and wore a beige turtleneck with a jean jumper, white knee socks, and sneakers. Frowning she asked, "Who are you?"

"Merrick. I'm guessing you're Anna Maria Myers."

"Close," she admitted. "My name is Anna Maria Artemis Myers."

"That's a mouthful," Merrick observed. The girl nodded and showed him a hand, all fingers spread out. "I'm five years old. This fall I'm going to kindergarten. But that's in five months."

"Impressive."

"Why are you here?"

"I need to talk to your parents. I used to help them out a bit. It was before you were born."

Anna Maria sniffed. "And you know that how?"

Merrick grinned. "I knew your mom before she met your dad."

"Oh? And how did they meet?" she questioned, with the air of a cross-examiner.

"Your dad gave your mom a speeding ticket."

The girl deflated. Merrick commented, "It's a good trick, but it didn't work on me because I did know your parents back in 2002."

"Well, I've never heard of you before," the girl retorted, her pride still clearly injured. Merrick looked away, sighing, "I didn't keep in touch. Not until today. Not until things clearly are about to reach to a head."

Anna Maria scrunched up her face, confused. But before she could ask what Merrick had meant her father returned, a corn-haired toddler on one hip. The toddler also had brown eyes like both parents, and wore a pair of overalls with a white undershirt. He was gnawing determinately at a colorful teething ring. Anna Maria informed Merrick, "This is my brother Ollie. That's short for Oliver Collins Myers. Mommy and Daddy agreed; Daddy would name any boys and Mommy would name any girls."

"That makes sense."

Eric advised his daughter, "Maybe next time you could make sure you pick up all your stuffed animals?"

"I did!"

"Well, I don't know how else Ollie could have gotten his little hands on your stuffed animals."

"Telekinesis?" Merrick suggested. Knowing that all things accounted for that **was** a viable option Eric groaned. "I hope not."

"Are you two joking?" Anna Maria questioned dubiously. Luckily both men were saved from answering from the front door opening a familiar voice calling out, "I'm home!"

Ollie removed his teething ring to chortle, "Mama!"

"Mommy!" Anna Maria cheered a heartbeat later. Eric called, "We're in the kitchen, Taylor."

"Okay."

Taylor was clearly recognizable, even if she was still in her Air Force uniform with her corn silk colored hair pulled back into a bun. But it was who entered the kitchen right after Taylor who had Merrick jumping in surprise and his heart suddenly pounding.

_Oh NO_, he thought to himself, his eyes wide.

…

Summer tossed the baseball, her boyfriend Dillon easily catching it. The two of them were taking an afternoon off from helping to rebuild a city they had found a month out from Corinth although due to zig-zaging and breaks it was only a full day's travel from the formerly last city of Earth. Ten months had passed since Dillon's arrival (and Ziggy's re-arrival) to Corinth, and four since the defeat of Corinth. The Earth was healing at an amazing rate; everyone who knew her suspected Dr. K had tweaked the bioelectric grid somehow although no one had dared outright ask her.

But the former Yellow and Black RPM Series Operators were taking a day off to just be together, and having had a picnic they were now playing catch. Summer, who had gold hair and green eyes, was wearing a yellow T-shirt and jean shorts. Dillon wore a black sweatshirt and slacks; he had dark brown hair and eyes as well as skin about as pale as his girlfriend's.

As he tossed the ball back to her they heard a disturbingly familiar noise; that of Grinders as they moved. Exchanging a look the pair ran towards the sound, which was right behind a hill. They found a dozen Grinders fighting a single human male although he was doing a decent job. Even as they hurried towards him he managed to defeat three of the Grinders. Summer and Dillon helped him defeat the others.

"Thanks," the guy nodded in appreciation. He had fair skin like them, with curly light brown hair. Dillon blinked in surprise at him.

"It's you!"

"Hey!" the other guy exclaimed as he recognized Dillon. "Glad to see you did whatever it was you needed to do."

"What?"

He replied to Summer, "Well, knowing him he wouldn't be chilling here if he hadn't. The guy escaped-"

"From one of Venjix's factories, yeah," Summer finished for him, a part of her comparing the situation to Gem and Gemma. "But how did you know that?"

"He's the guy who set me up with the Fury," Dillon explained, staring at the guy like he was a ghost.

"Okay…"

The guy sighed. "Look, maybe I shouldn't just drop this on you, but I don't think Venjix was completely defeated."

Both opened their mouths to argue and/or ask a question.

"I know he was at least partially defeated because otherwise the world wouldn't be healing. But there are still bands of Grinders out there."

"Just leftovers," Summer refuted. The guy looked wistful.

"Somehow I doubt that. Dax is going to be upset that I got to say this before him but- could you guys please take me to your leader? Or rather, take me to your mentor?"

Summer's thoughts on the matter were this: "if this guy is right, oh NO because we put so much into stopping Venjix; he can't still exist".


	4. Chapter 4: Fairy Tales

The chaos is just getting revved up but I own NONE of it. Anything recognizable, anyway.

The plot bunny and the OCs are mine.

* * *

**Chapter Four: Fairy Tales**

Merrick let out a squeak.

Taylor and Eric both looked horrified, while the fourth adult in the kitchen was staring at Merrick in shock and timid hope.

"Merrick?"

"Princess," he managed to get out.

"WHAT?" demanded Anna Maria. Quickly making the connection the young girl accused her mother, "You said the magic flying island stories you guys tell me at bedtime were just stories! Are they real? So… the island isn't named after me, I'm named after an island?"

Then she turned on her father. "Are those clock tower bedtime stories true too then?"

"Anna Maria, sweetie, I think we better leave…" Eric replied uneasily. Taylor shot him a look that clearly said 'traitor'. But Merrick intervened before Eric could take a single step.

"No, I'll go. Jason and Tommy just wanted you guys to get the middle teams in the know- Lost Galaxy through Wild Force. There, I said it. And there'll be a meeting of the early teams this Saturday to see what's what. There, message complete. I don't know why this couldn't have been said in an e-mail!"

Merrick darted out the door. Thirty seconds later he poked his head through as he cracked the back door open.

"It was an honor to see you again, Princess. Farewell."

Then he was really gone.

Taylor commented to Princess Shayla, "You should have just kissed him."

"Are you really a princess?" Anna Maria asked. Princess Shayla blushed.

"Yes, but I wish I wasn't."

The young girl snorted. Then she turned towards the door in understanding.

"Ah, I get it. Merrick isn't a prince so he doesn't think he's worthy of you. Classic fairy tale scenario."

"More and more I realize why Wes was scared when I told him we were reproducing," Eric told his wife. Taylor rolled her eyes and pulled out her scrunchie from her hair, letting her corn silk hued hair tumble past her shoulders.

The Princess looked wistful and looked down at her white dress. She looked identical to how she had looked the last time Taylor and Merrick had seen her.

"I wonder what exactly is going on. You and Wes had to tackle some Batlings downtown last Friday, didn't you?"

Princess Shayla touched her cheek, the same one where on Merrick his faded scratch had been. "He was hurt."

"Of course he was; he had just seen you again!" Eric observed. When his wife and daughter gave him dark looks he hurriedly added, "Because he regrets not having been able to stay with you on the Animarium."

"But he didn't want to stay!" Princess Shayla replied, confused.

Eric leaned down and kissed his teething son Ollie on the head.

"And girls say they're the complicated ones."

…

Summer and Dillon had taken the stranger and now the trio was sitting around the kitchen table eating chocolate chip cookies and glasses of milk. Summer asked, "So… who are you, anyway?"

"My name is Mack Hartford,' he smiled lopsidedly. "Can I wait to explain everything about me until we're in Corinth with the rest of your team? I want to go through the explanation just once."

If Mack's story was anywhere near as complicated and lengthy as RPM's Summer couldn't exactly blame him. Dillon demanded, "Where have you been? You helped me out of the factory, gave me the Fury and the tools to get to Corinth, and then left!"

"Sorry. But I wanted to focus on stopping the hybrid process wherever and whenever possible while you needed to find your sister… and yourself."

A dark shadow crossed Mack's face when he said 'hybrids', and it made his face look rather dangerous for a moment. Neither Summer nor Dillon could complain; both knew the horrors of Venjix's hybrid process. Mack cheered up.

"It turned out for the best, though. I ended up freeing these two hyper kids from another factory and helped them hone their powers. Since I don't know quite how the bioelectric grid operates here I don't know if you ran into them."

Summer and Dillon exchanged confused looks. Mack grinned. "You would know them if you met them, trust me."

Their faces lit up in realization. Dillon started, "Gem…"

"And Gemma?" Summer finished for her boyfriend. Mack beamed.

"That's them. Huh. So that K they kept chatting about is the same as your mentor K?"

"How many people could be named K?" Summer reasoned. Mack dunked a cookie into his glass of milk as he protested, "What part of 'I don't fully get this bioelectric grid' didn't you understand?"

"This bioelectric grid?" Summer frowned. "There's more than one?"

"Well, there's one Power but each dimension has their own bioelectric grid, yes."

Dillon eyed Mack. "You're from another dimension?"

"That's part of that long explanation," Mack sighed.

"We'll head out in the Fury in the morning," Dillon decided, glancing at the clock. "It's getting kind of late."

"I could look around for some clothes for you," Summer suggested. Mack shook his head. "Thanks, but no thanks."

"Your clothes are in a bad state though."

Mack shrugged his shoulders, and in a faint red line crossed down his body so that his outfit changed from a dusty red T-shirt with torn-up jeans to a clean red polo shirt with crisp khaki pants. Letting out a relieved sigh he noted, "That has to be the handiest trick Mystic Force taught us."

"No kidding," a wide-eyed Summer commented.

"What are you, my fairy godfather?" a confounded Dillon asked.

"N-" Mack cut himself short. "Maybe. I doubt it though, 'cause that would make me the twins' fairy godfather too."

"I'll let you two boys catch up while I set up the guest bedroom for you, Mack." With that Summer pushed back her chair and got up. The two males said bye as she left. Mack chuckled.

"Well, you have good taste. She's almost as pretty as my Rose, and just as nice. Not as smart, though, no offense."

His face turned wistful. "I miss her."

"What…?" Dillon was half-afraid to ask.

"She's back in the dimension I come from. My dad and I were investigating some ruins last year and I ended up accidentally traveling here with no way back due to the Venjix holocaust."

"What did Venjix do to prevent you from going home?"

"He killed all the trees."

Dillon started to grin but stopped when he saw that the other man was serious.

"Okay then."

Mack opted to change the subject.

"The name Dillon suits you."

"Yeah, I guess," he shrugged.

Mack yawned. "Want to give me the run-down on what you've been up to since I gave you the Fury, so that your teammates don't have to endure two explanations?"

"All right. I tried to make my way to Corinth…"

…

Jason and Tommy came home to the latter's home after doing grocery shopping that evening. Their arms full of bags they walked through the house. Then they saw a rigid Merrick nursing a can of ginger ale on the couch, the TV on. The two men exchanged a look.

"Um, waiting for _NCIS_ to come on?" Tommy asked. Merrick nodded, "I need it."

Jason gave Tommy a confused look; his best friend just shrugged uneasily.

"Uh, did you tell Eric and Taylor to be alert and to pass the word on?"

Merrick nodded, faintly shuddering.

"Er, did something happen on your way home?"

Merrick shook his head, taking a tiny sip of ginger ale.

"Hm, are you all right?"

Merrick just shook his head jerkily.

"Mm… then what's wrong?"

Merrick just hunched down, his eyes still on the TV screen. Jason rolled his eyes; he would have done a face-palm but his arms were full of groceries.

"Would you just tell us already?"

"The world is in serious trouble."

Jason and Tommy exchanged a look. The latter informed Merrick, "We kind of got that memo already, remember?"

"NO! Real trouble, as in the Animarium is at direct risk trouble!" Merrick replied, his eyes on the TV screen. Jason made a sound of understanding.

"Princess Shayla was there, wasn't she?"

Tommy winced in sympathy.

"Taylor brought her home with her," Merrick acknowledged. "Why didn't anyone warn me?"

"I don't think anyone thought it would happen," Tommy commented. "Just wait and watch _NCIS_ and _NCIS: LA_, Merrick. You'll feel much better after that."

Merrick just took another consoling sip of ginger ale as Jason and Tommy moved on to put away their groceries.

…

The following morning found Summer, Dillon, and Mack driving across the healing land towards Corinth. The trio had gotten up super early and said their good-byes to Tenaya before heading out. Patches of green were visible, and a few tiny saplings were protruding from the earth. And the sky was blue with white clouds.

Although quiet, the trip was going well under the Fury was shot at via blasters.

"Whoa!" yelled Dillon, swerving as more blaster fire tried to hit the vehicle. Summer clung to the dashboard while Mack hung on for dear life in the back. The trio managed to see that their attackers were a man and a woman in formal suits with big blasters that they were clearly unafraid to use.

As Dillon continued to drive, focusing on keeping the car and its occupants in one piece Mack started to pull red glowing lines out of literally the air, using them to create a hologram chart that began to look like an advanced keyboard. With a gulp he pressed a couple of the chart's "buttons". In a flash of red light the Fury vanished.

Suddenly Dillon found himself and the Fury in a familiar place- the Garage. He turned off the engine and looked back at Mack.

"I'm guessing you're responsible for that?"

Mack nodded weakly.

"How come you didn't do that in the first place?"

"Um… I wasn't sure if it would work."

Summer made an agreeing sound.

"He has a point."

Dillon half-shrugged in understanding.

Meanwhile, over in the kitchen area Ziggy (wearing a lime green apron and chef's hat over a green T-shirt and black jeans) was staring slack-jawed at the reappearance of the Fury, a spatula covered in strawberry icing in hand. There was a yellow cake on a platter to one side of the counter, and on the other was a bowl full of more strawberry icing.

Dillon poked his head out the window.

"Sorry we interrupted your baking session, Ziggy."

"Oh, no problem," the former Ranger Green managed after a moment. "No problem at all."


	5. Chapter 5: Junior Rangers

And so the chaos keeps growing… without me owning Power Rangers. Sigh.

Mack had to do a Star Wars reference; I don't own that either.

* * *

**Chapter Five: Junior Rangers**

The icing-covered spatula still in hand Ziggy walked over to the Fury.

"What are you guys doing here? _How_ did you guys get here?"

Summer and Dillon looked back at Mack, who shrugged.

"I manipulated the bioelectric grid; it's something I've done before but never quite on this scale before. That's why I didn't do it right away, plus I don't know this bioelectric grid like I know the one from my dimension."

"Can a lot of people manipulate the bioelectric grid?" Summer wondered.

"Not to the degree that I can, no. I hear that the First Ten of my dimension can do it, and I know Nick is way better at it than me. But I can do things with it no one else can due to my… ah… unique heritage."

"Are you an alien?" Ziggy asked hopefully. Mack shook his head, responding, "No, but I do know one."

"Sweet!"

"Speaking of sweet…" Dillon trailed off meaningfully. Ziggy glowered at Dillon. "No. It's for K. Today is the one year anniversary of her revealing herself to us so the cake is for her. And by golly, she's going to eat it!"

Mack looked at the trio. "And I thought my team was weird. Actually, there's been grumbling that my team wasn't weird enough."

"Oh, our team does not have that problem," Summer sighed. Mack grinned, "I'm starting to think that Dillon must have downplayed the weirdness when he told me about you guys' adventures."

"You did what?" Ziggy frowned at his best friend. Dillon defended himself, saying, "He's the guy who gave me the Fury."

"So… he's the Fury's mom since you're its dad?"

"NO!" both men yelled. Ziggy rolled his eyes. "I was just checking."

Summer hid a smile as she exited the car. "Mack had to teleport us in when we were attacked."

"By whom?"

"We don't know," Dillon replied as he got out of the Fury himself. Mack followed, stretching.

"All right, time for me to meet this K."

"Uh… that might not be a good thing."

"She doesn't want a cake does she?" Summer sighed.

"I have my doubts, yes. But she likes sweets so it'll work out."

Summer and Dillon exchanged troubled looks. Mack just felt and looked confounded.

The sliding steel doors were resolutely closed. Summer knocked on one.

"Doc? Um, it's me and Dillon. We brought someone who needs to talk to you."

Unwillingly the doors slid open. Summer, Dillon, and Mack entered the lab within while Ziggy returned to his cake. A petite teenager with pale skin and a black pageboy in a white lab coat was typing at a computer consol.

Mack waved warily. "So… you're Dr. K?"

"Yes," she answered briskly, shutting down the computer. "What is occurring now?"

"There are still some Grinders out there, which has Mack here thinking that Venjix might not be completely gone."

Instead of denying it she just closed her eyes. "I was afraid of that."

"And you didn't warn us of this possibility why?" Dillon asked curtly. She smiled lopsidedly. "Blame Ziggy's influence on me. Besides, hadn't you Rangers been through enough?"

"And you didn't want it to be true," Mack guessed. K inclined her head in acknowledgement. Mack sighed and shook his head.

"I've been to Alphabet Soup, so I know a good bit about how your handlers got you to make the virus. I have no idea if this will make you feel better or not, but they were planned to unleash the Venjix Virus two years ago no matter what. Under their guidance I'm betting the world would have fallen in less than a year, instead of four with a single city still free."

Summer whistled. "You're implying that K's failed jailbreak might have been the best way for the cards to fall?"

"More or less," Mack agreed. "But right now I need to get home… I've been away for way too long."

"But-" K began, then Mack overrode her. "I'm from another dimension, okay?"

She blinked. Mack sighed, "Yes, I know I sound crazy but it's true. Look, not to sound arrogant but a lot of Ranger activity happened in my home dimension. If Venjix is going to go anywhere, he'll go there."

"Why wouldn't he just stay here?" Dillon refuted.

Shaking his head Mack replied, "He's been beaten here; he'll want to go somewhere fresh. Plus, the bioelectric grid in my dimension is particularly powerful, resulting in all those Power Rangers."

"That makes sense," Summer admitted. K commented, "I should come with you; no matter what my handlers had planned, I was the one who actually released Venjix."

"Not without me!" Ziggy retorted as he walked in, holding up the now-iced cake on a platter. Summer agreed, "Dillon and I want to come too; and I'm sure the other Rangers will want to as well."

"I'll pack the morphers then."

"You'll probably have to 'rewire' them to get them to work in my dimension; I know I had to 'rewire' mine to get it to work here. I left my helmet behind when some villains showed up in Alphabet Soup… but I got it back."

"Will you have to 'rewire' it again once you're back home?" K wondered. Mack shrugged, "I guess I'll find out. Now, I haven't been home in over a year… I'd appreciate it if you guys would pack fast."

"Dillon and I are packed already," Summer noted. K commented, "I'll inform the others so they can hurry home and pack."

"Thanks," Mack beamed. "Home sweet home, here I come!"

Two hours later everyone was in the park; Scott, Flynn, Summer, Ziggy, Dillon, Gem, Gemma, K, and Mack. The RPM team had their Ranger jackets on in addition to their backpacks. Mack placed a hand on a sturdy, large tree. Nodding happily he said, "This one will let all of us through."

Scott had to ask, "If trees can serve as inter-dimensional portals, how did you get stuck here so recently?"

"My dad and I were checking out some ruins and I must have accidentally triggered something because I ended up in the place's counterpart in this dimension. But then there was a rock fall, so I couldn't get back and try to find a way back home."

"How horrid," Flynn frowned.

"It was probably worse for my teammates and my dad," Mack frowned. "I hope they're all okay. The space-time difference between our dimensions was too great for me to contact anyone. I might have almost gotten Bridge from a third dimension but I'm not sure."

"Bridge?"

Mack chuckled. "He's great, just great. Everyone loves Bridge. All right, let's go."

One by one everyone went through the tree, feeling an odd shiver go down their back as they went through the tree. They stepped out into the edge of a spacious lawn. Facing the woods was an expansive white mansion. Mack's face lit up completely.

"Home sweet home."

He started to run across the lawn, heedless of everything else. "DAD! SPENCER! I'm home!"

At a more sedate pace the RPM team followed. Scott noted, "Someone is glad to be home."

"He's been away for over a year, I think it's justified," Ziggy defended Mack. The front door opened to reveal a stout greying man in a suit. He blinked in surprise at the running Mack.  
…

Spencer Spencer blinked in surprise at the sight he saw. "Master Mack?"

"SPENCER!" Mack yelled elatedly. Spencer waved his greeting before retreating inside the Hartford mansion. Andrew Hartford was sitting dejected at his desk, having failed again in finding out what had happened to his son.

"Sir?"

"What, Spencer?"

"I think you might want to go outside."

"Why?"

"Oh, you'll see."

With a deep exhale Mr. Hartford got to his feet. "Fine."

Spencer smiled.

Hardly had Mr. Hartford opened the front door when he was tackled.

"Oof," he went, falling flat on his back. Blinking he found his son's face inches away from his own.

"DAD!" Mack yelled happily, hugging him.

"MACK!" Mr. Hartford yelled back, returning the hug. "Where have you _been_?"

"I've stuck in another dimension where everything had been wrecked by a psychotic computer virus," Mack apologized. "I only managed to find trees healthy enough to transport beings through dimensions today."

"I'm just glad you're okay!" Mr. Hartford exclaimed, hugging his son tight. "Don't ever scare me like that again!"

"Aw, Dad, I've scared you worse before," Mack grinned. Mr. Hartford frowned at his son. "Don't joke about that."

"It always ends well for us Rangers," Mack shrugged happily as he helped his dad to his feet. "Um, I brought some friends. 'Cause I think the computer virus they battled has made its way to this dimension."

"That can't be good," frowned Mr. Hartford. "There have been already been repeated attacks in several cities by multiple formerly defeated villains over the past week. Something major is going on."

Mack decided, "Well, then we'd better rally up all us junior Rangers so we can exchange information and actually meet one another."

"Good plan," Mr. Hartford nodded. "I'll talk to your new friends while you call everyone up."

"Right," Mack nodded, dashing off. Spencer, from the end of the foyer, smiled.

"Ah, it's good that he's come home."

"Quite," Mr. Hartford beamed, just as the RPM team came up the stairs. Dr. K, in her massive white cloak, heaved a sigh of relief once she was inside, pulling back the hood. She stuck her hand out in Mr. Hartford's direction.

"Hello, I am Dr. K, mentor of the RPM Rangers."

"Even if she's younger than the rest of us," Ziggy muttered, causing all the other Rangers to sigh or hide a smile- or do both. Mr. Hartford introduced himself as he shook K's hand.

"I'm Andrew Hartford, mentor of the Operation Overdrive Power Rangers. Nice to meet you all; thanks for helping my son."

"No problem," Scott commented. "I'm Scott, Ranger Red; this is Flynn, Ranger Blue; this is Summer, Ranger Yellow; that's Ziggy… Ranger Green; this is Dillon, Ranger Black; and these two are Gem and Gemma, Rangers Gold and Silver."

"Nice to meet you," Mr. Hartford nodded as he released K's hand. "Come in, all of you."

As Mr. Hartford led the RPM team to the rec room they passed Mack on the phone.

"Yes, Rose, I'm fine. Did I miss you? Of course I did! You're my girlfriend? … I missed everyone else too, yes. Now come on over to the mansion; I've heard that some weird stuff has been going on in the past week. I'm inviting over everyone."

The eight newcomers sat down on the couch. Summer looked around uneasily; this place reminded her a little too much of her own old home. Dillon squeezed her hand in reassurance, so she smiled weakly at him well aware that her old self wouldn't have gotten a second look from him. Actually her current self wouldn't give her old self a second look.

For the next ten minutes a veritable stream of people flowed into the rec room. First came a group of five, led by a petite Hispanic woman in pink and black punk clothes who hugged and kissed Mack. The others just gave Mack hugs.

Then more came in, including a group of six who thought they were delivering pizzas but were soon assured it was okay that everyone present knew they were the Power Rangers team of 2008 (plus an ally). Once everyone was together Mack commented, "All right, what's been going on while I've been gone?"

"Not much until about two weeks ago," a fair-skinned man with chestnut hair shrugged. He wore a black leather jacket, a red golf shirt, and khaki pants. "Dr. O. has been acting weird lately; I think he knows stuff that we don't."

"Conner, since when has that not been the case?" demanded an African-American man with a jean jacket, jeans, and a cyan shirt. The man- Conner- shrugged amiably. "Good point, Ethan. All right, the rest of you can chill here. Mack, can you, me, and the other Reds use your 'official' base for a quick Red Council?"

"Sure," Mack nodded. Two men- a stern one with clipped dirty blond hair and a mellow one with floppy brown hair- looked over at a third man, who had chocolate-brown skin and black dreadlocks. He sighed, "I had the red SPD morpher first, enough said. You two chill here."

"Can I go make buttery toast?"

"No," the other two told the third, whose gloved fingers had wiggled when he said 'buttery'. Spencer intervened, saying, "It is quite all right if Mister Bridge wishes to use the kitchen."

Blowing a raspberry at his teammates Bridge started to dash off, then paused. As he looked back at the group he offered, "Any other Greens want to come along?"

"Crikey," sighed a second brown-haired man, but he got to his feet. "Lead the way, Bridge."

A man with almond eyes and silky black hair stood up as well, commenting wryly, "Someone has to keep you two from using up all the bread…"

Ziggy asked hopefully, "Can I come?'

"Are you a Green?" the second Green asked. Ziggy looked down at his green T-shirt. "Yes."

"Then you can come," he shrugged with a smile. Giving his teammates a farewell salute Ziggy dashed after the more senior Greens. Conner noted, "Fine, you all can do color-coded meetings of your own. Have fun with that. Come on, Reds."

"Behave," Scott informed his teammates, pointing a finger at the twins especially, before following behind the other Reds. Mack opened up a panel in the wall to reveal five firefighter-style poles, each with a different colored panel behind it- red, black, blue, yellow, and pink. Everyone opted for the red one.

Scott took a look around once at the bottom of the pole. The area opened up into a high tech room with a globe made of metal bars in its center, the walls covered in computer consuls. Only the tawny and earthy tones used kept it from making Scott feel like he was back home in K's lab.

Conner asked two of the guys, "Shane, Hunter, do you mind if I take the lead here?"

One of the two he had just addressed, a tawny-skinned man with jet black hair in jeans and a red sweatshirt, shook his head. "Nah, Conner, you're the one who was on a team with Dr. O."

"Yeah," agreed the other, a pale guy with light blond hair. He wore a red T-shirt and khaki pants. Conner grinned at the pair. "Just checking; you two do have seniority over me. And as the most senior Reds here, how about you two introduce yourselves first?"

"Fine; I'm Shane Clarke, the Red Wind Ranger of Power Rangers Ninja Storm, and this is Hunter Bradley, the Crimson Thunder Ranger," the first guy explained. The second guy- Hunter- waved. "Hey."

"And I'm Conner McKnight, the Red Dino Ranger."

"Jack Landors, the first SPD Red Ranger," the guy who had briefly talked to Bridge and the other guy introduced himself.

"Uh… I have two names. Do I give the name my birth parents gave me, or the one my adoptive sister gave me," asked the next Red Ranger, a guy with tawny skin and crinkly black hair. He wore a black motorcycle jacket over a red shirt and black jeans. Conner scratched the back of his head.

"Both, and tell us which you prefer to be called."

"Okay. My birth parents named me Bowen but I still response mostly to my adoptive name- Nick. I'm the Red Mystic Ranger. Oh, and technically my birth dad is a Red too but I can just fill him in later."

"Cool. Mack, you're next, right?"

"Uh-huh. I'm Mack Hartford, the Red Overdrive Ranger."

A fair-skinned guy with sandy hair mostly hidden behind a red-orange JKP cap commented, "Uh, hi. I'm Casey Rhodes, the Red Jungle Fury Ranger."

"Hi, Casey, nice to meet you," Shane commented. The other Reds nodded. Scott then commented, "All right, I'm the only one left; I'm Scott Truman and I'm Ranger Red."

Conner noted in horror, "Dude, that's like _sacrilege_."

"What is?" Scott asked, confused.

"Just Ranger Red is your status?" Conner pressed.

"K did it not me… whatever 'it' is."

"That's just wrong," Jack agreed with Conner. Shane and Conner nodded, looking disturbed as well. Casey at least looked as befuddled as Scott. Nick/Bowen seemed wary.

Mack hurriedly intervened, "Conner, chill. The dimension Scott came from it like Tatooine compared to our Coruscant."

Conner still looked dubious so Mack elaborated, "Near as I can tell, the RPM team is the first Power Ranger team on the Earth of that dimension. They're that dimension's equivalent to our first Six."

Suddenly Shane, Hunter, Conner, Jack, and Nick's expressions are cleared into surprised respect. Casey and Scott were still befuddled. The latter asked, "Okay… could someone explain things to me here, because I'm at a loss."

Conner exhaled.

"Sorry for overreacting but basically the first seven morphers given out gave their users these statuses: Red Power Ranger, Black Power Ranger, Yellow Power Ranger, Pink Power Ranger, Blue Power Ranger, Green Power Ranger, and White Power Ranger. That was because they were the first modern-day Power Rangers of this dimension. Every team after that based their Ranger status off of their team and/or abilities."

"Oh," Scott realized. "My team's use of just 'Ranger Red' was kind of like saying we're on par with the first Power Rangers."

"Except in a sense you are on par with them," noted Jack. "You're the first Power Rangers of your dimension, huh?"

"Well, nobody had heard of superheroes like that before K suggested her Project Ranger to help protect Corinth," Scott admitted. "But Dad went with it, mostly because we didn't exactly have a lot of options at the time."

"Why?" Hunter asked. Scott sighed, "It's a _long_ story."

"Yeah, but unfortunately we need to get down to business," Conner noted. "Something big is brewing, no doubt."

Casey nodded. "I have to agree. Some weird things have been fought off by my students at the academy lately. Not Rin Shi though."

"Same here in Blue Bay Harbor, but with us it's no Kelzacks," agreed Hunter. Jack observed, "There's been a distinct drop in evil-doing activities in my dimension, so whatever is going down is going to focus on this dimension."

"Same here with the magical dimension, but there've been more attacks in Briarwood," Nick backed up Jack, folding his arms across his chest.

Conner ran a hand through his hair.

"Well, then, we're just going to have to remind these bad guys why you don't mess with the Power Rangers- not even the junior ones."

If anyone wants to discuss my theory, I'm open to PMs.


	6. Chapter 6: Club Bulkmeier

More un-owned by me Power Rangers chaos! Anything you recognize, I don't own. Zack's kids are my OCs though, just like Jason's kids and Eric & Taylor's kids.

* * *

**Chapter Six: Club Bulkmeier**

It was Saturday.

The two men known as Bulk and Skull had made plans to cordon off their business Club Bulkmeier from ten o'clock AM to three o'clock PM, and it was currently nine thirty. A large round table was covered with a tie-dyed tablecloth, with eighteen chairs placed at the table.

At a distance from the table two colorful beach balls and a black inner tube were floating in the pool, whose waters glinted in the early morning light. The pool was ringed by lounge chairs.

"Bulk, I've been thinking," Skull informed his best friend since childhood, a pretzel stick in the corner of his mouth as he lounged against the counter of the tiki bar. On the other side of the tiki bar, Bulk paused in his cleaning of the smoothie glasses.

"Oh?"

"How bad do you think things have to be for all of the first eighteen Rangers to get together?"

"Pretty bad," Bulk decided, resuming his cleaning. Skull agreed, "Yeah, that's what I thought."

"Is everything set?" Tommy asked as he strolled in through the gateway, wearing a white shirt tie-dyed in green, red, and black with brown slacks. Skull smoothed back his greased hair. "Of course it is."

He turned to Bulk. "It is, right?"

"Yeah," Bulk nodded. Skull smiled at Tommy. "Everything is set."

"Good," Tommy praised the pair. "Thanks for letting us use your club."

"Pst, anything for the Power Rangers," Skull waved it off. Bulk nodded, "You guys saved the world; it's the least we can do."

"Especially since you're having the meeting in order to save the world again," Skull noted. Tommy rubbed the back of his neck. "Good point, both of you."

"We got rid of any customers already, so no worries about being overheard," Bulk assured the five-time Ranger, who nodded his thanks.

Jason and Adam were lounging in two lounge chairs by the pool. Tommy walked over to his two friends, amused. Jason was wearing a red tank top and khaki pants while Adam wore a black and green striped golf shirt with jeans.

"What are you two doing?"

"I have no idea," Adam replied, his eyes still closed. "What is this called again, Jason?"

"Relaxing," the other man sighed blissfully. Adam's mouth curved upward in a slight smile. "That's it. We're relaxing."

Tommy rubbed his temples wearily. "Guys, the other fourteen Rangers are going to be showing up soon, this is no time to relax!"

"Sure it is," a contented Jason waved off Tommy's concerns. "We probably won't get another chance to relax until this whole mess gets resolved… in other words, not for months."

"I'm with Jason."

"You two are exaggerating," Tommy rolled his eyes. "If everyone gets together in order to fight Ivan Ooze there'll be some opportunities to relax for everyone."

Both men each opened a single eye to look at Tommy.

"Okay, fine, you're right. We won't take those opportunities to relax. Go ahead, relax while you can then."

The eyes closed.

Shaking his head in amusement Tommy headed over to the table and looked it over. Nobody was sure how long the meeting was going to take, but they knew a lot of catching up and some sparring was inevitable so they had opted for too much time than too little. Five hours ought to cover it.

Just then Billy exited the garden shed, dragging an extension cord behind him. Tommy asked him, "So you'll be all set for the Powerpoint presentation?"

"Affirmative," the Blue Ranger nodded as he continued walking over so he could get all set up for said presentation. Billy wore a jean jacket, a white T-shirt, and jeans.

"Need any help?"

"Negative, Tommy, although I appreciate the offer of assistance."

"No problem."

A woman with almond eyes and long silky black hair entered the outdoors area of Club Bulkmeier just then, dressed in a yellow sundress. Both Billy and Tommy waved to her.

"Trini!" they chorused in delight. Waving back the first Yellow Power Ranger greeted them, "Hey, you guys. How are you?"

"As well as we can be under the circumstances," Billy replied as he set up his computer for the council. Trini sighed as she walked over to them, "Yeah… I think I saw Zack's van pull in as I headed towards the entrance."

"Morphinominal!" Billy commented. "The sooner we're all here the sooner we can begin."

Tommy and Trini nodded.

Two chocolate-skinned kids ran into the club, a younger boy with clipped hair followed by a slightly older girl with multiple braids. They were followed by an equally dark-skinned man in a black T-shirt and black jeans, calling after them, "Angie! Chris! Wait up!"

Tommy did a face-palm. "Zack brought his kids along?"

"Apparently," Trini noted with amusement as the boy cannonballed into the pool despite wearing an orange T-shirt and overalls rather than a bathing suit. Zack managed to scoop up his daughter before she could do the same.

"Chris!"

But the boy was swimming happily in the pool, oblivious to his father's annoyance. Giggling Angie rested her head on her father's shoulder.

"I love you, Daddy. You're so much fun."

"You just say that because somehow you two manage to wrap me around your little fingers every time," Zack shook his head, but he was smiling. Nonetheless he tried again to get his young son's attention. "CHRIS!"

The boy poked his head out of the water. "Yes, Dad?"

"Would you get out of the pool?"

"You didn't say the magic word," the boy sang.

Zack looked over at his friends. "Was I this aggravating as a kid?"

Tommy shrugged, Trini did a so-so gesture with her hand, and Billy just looked down at his feet in a refusal to answer which was answer enough. Zack just looked upward and sighed, "_Please_ would you get out of the pool, Christopher?"

"Okay." And the boy started to paddle towards the ladder. Trini asked, "Zack, why are the kids with you?"

"Angela had a last minute business trip last night, and I just figured I couldn't hurt that much to bring them along."

"They're been here for less than five minutes and already one of them has cannonballed into the pool, and it wasn't both of them from a lack of trying," Tommy observed. Zack just put down his daughter, protesting, "You're getting too big for me to pick you up."

"No I'm not, I'm only six and a half!" Angie protested back. Her dripping little brother came over and stuck his tongue out at her. "I'm just almost five. Daddy can still pick me up with- aah!"

The 'aah' came about because his sister had pushed him into the pool. Surfacing Chris splashed water at her, missing, prior to complaining, "Daddy, Angie pushed me into the pool!"

"He was already wet," Angie defended herself. During all of this Jason and Adam had kept their eyes resolutely closed, but now smiles were starting to creep onto their faces. Zack glowered at the pair.

"Traitors."

"What on Earth did I miss?" laughed TJ Johnson as he entered the area, followed by his wife Cassie. TJ wasn't as dark as Zack, and had a shaved head. He wore a violet T-shirt and khaki pants while his wife wore a pink T-shirt and jean shorts. She had long black hair, fair skin, and almond brown eyes.

Surprisingly remembering that neither newcomer knew Zack, Trini, or Billy nor did they know them Tommy hurriedly held introductions.

"TJ, the two chaotic kids are Zack's. This is Trini and that's Billy. You two already know Jason and Adam. Guys, these two are TJ and Cassie."

Cassie started to open her mouth but then closed it. Everyone glanced at the kids, aware that like their mother they didn't know about their father's 'extracurricular activity' in high school. Angie sniffed loudly.

"I can tell when we're not wanted. Come along, Christopher."

Followed by her re-soaked brother she flounced away. Zack shook his head admiringly.

"She takes after her mom."

"The horror," Jason murmured teasingly under his breath, thinking on the **very** strong-willed Angela. His wife Emily had a strong will of her own, but Angela took it to a whole another level. He and Adam were now sitting up with their eyes open but Adam suddenly found himself wishing they were still closed when Tanya Sloan entered Club Bulkmeier.

The elegant African woman was dark chocolate brown with black hair in a bun, dressed in a yellow blouse with beige slacks and a beige jacket. She smiled shyly at Adam.

"Hey, Adam. I heard you got back into the real action a couple of years ago."

He nodded awkwardly. "Uh-huh. 2007; it was fun. How are you? That last CD of yours went over great."

Tanya's cheeks flushed. "Thanks."

Then came a bashful silence between the duo broken by Zack's observation, "If you two had a kid the poor child would be mute!"

TJ commented while Adam and Tanya were stuttering, "I take it from your T-shirt you preceded Adam as the Black Power Ranger?"

"Yeah. I still don't get how come he got to use the Black Power Coin an additional two times while I didn't get to at all!"

Jason rolled his eyes, making Zack scowl at him. "You're no better, using the Red Power Coin in 2002! And before that, you let Tommy talk you into being the Gold Zeo Ranger!"

Tommy unsuccessfully tried to turn a laugh into a cough, leading the first Black Power Ranger to turn on him. Pointing a finger at him Zack stated, "And don't make me get started on you, Thomas Oliver!"

Cassie laughed, "Zack has a point, Tommy."

The five-time Ranger just rolled his eyes, a faint blush creeping up onto his cheeks. Billy mock-complained, "What about me, Zachary?"

"You didn't share," he sniffed at his best friend. Billy beamed happily, "No I didn't."

A Hispanic man with wavy black hair and brown eyes hurried in, wearing a green T-shirt and black pants. He waved at Adam, who waved back.

"Hey, Carlos. Glad to see you."

"Glad to see you, Adam!" he smiled back. Adam informed the other older Rangers, "This is Carlos. He served with TJ and Cassie during later Turbo and during in Space."

"Nice to meet you," Zack nodded. "I'm Zack, the first Black Power Ranger."

"Wow; so you have seniority over even Adam?" an impressed Carlos asked. As Zack nodded Jason, Trini, Billy, and Tommy all commented, "So do I!"

"Hey, everyone!" a young man greeted them as he entered the club. He had fair skin and brown hair, appearing to be only in his mid-twenties while everyone else present (minus Zack's kids of course) looked to be heading into their thirties.

"Justin!" Tommy, Adam, TJ, Cassie, and Carlos all responded. Billy commented happily, "Ah, at last I encounter the second pure Blue. Greetings."

"Oh, hey, you must be Billy. The other early Turbo Rangers kept comparing me to you."

"I wonder why," Tommy rolled his eyes. Billy just glowered at his teammate. "Tommy, recall that I am a Wolf Ranger and ergo can defeat you if I push myself… and I am starting to feel pushed."

Trini and Zack exchanged an amused look; even if he was still Billy, he had learned to tone down the vocabulary so that neither of them needed to translate for him anymore. Cassie glanced at her wristwatch.

"Ashley, Andros, and Zhane should be coming soon. But first they have to convince Karone to baby-sit all their kids plus ours."

"I won't complain if-" But Tommy's promise was meant to say unsaid because just then a huge poof of flour appeared out of another area of Club Bulkmeier, complete with sound effects.

"Oh Putties!" yelped Zack as he dashed off. Justin asked, "Uh… did I miss something?"

"His kids probably caused that," Billy explained.

"Oh…"

"Sorry we're late!" A brown-haired man ran in, followed more calmly by a cocoa-skinned woman with long, multiple braids. He wore a red turtleneck sweater with jeans while she wore a yellow halter top with a jean skirt. Adam got to his feet and rushed over to the pair, giving them hugs.

"Rocky! Aisha! No, you guys aren't late."

"Oh, whew," the man chuckled sheepishly. Adam told the junior Rangers, "Guys, these two are Rocky and Aisha. He's the second Red Power Ranger and the Blue Zeo Ranger while she was the second Yellow Power Ranger."

"Good to see you again, Trini," Aisha greeted the other woman. Turning to the other Yellow present she commented, "You too, Tanya."

Adam looked around. "Zack's here too, but he had to go make sure his kids didn't cause too much chaos."

Rocky and Aisha looked befuddled. Justin assured them, "I don't get it either. I'm Justin, the Blue Turbo Ranger."

"Hi, nice to meet my replacement," Rocky joked. "Sorry about leaving such big shoes for you to fill…"

Jason, Billy, Tommy, Adam, and Aisha all groaned at the joke. The younger Rangers then found it permissible to smile. Rocky did so too, taking a bow while proclaiming, "Thank you! I'll be here 'til three!"

Jason's expression clearly stated: "why did I pick this guy as my successor again?" It made Tommy laugh… but he stopped laughing in a hurry when he saw Katherine Hilliard entering the club. Billy gave him a sympathetic look.

The Aussie-born woman had fair blond hair and bright blue eyes, and as far as a certain five-time Ranger was concerned the most beautiful woman in any dimension. Not that he would say that where a Wolf might overhear, of course. Katherine wore a pink pleated skirt with a pale pink spaghetti strap top. She smiled at everyone.

"Hey, mates." She blushed and glanced away when she saw Tommy, who was trying to hide behind Trini (who was NOT cooperating). So he hid behind Billy, who let Tommy hide behind him. Adam felt rather proud of himself for not hiding when Tanya showed up.

TJ sidled over to Jason. "Um… it didn't come up in our mission eight years so… yeah… uh…?"

"They broke up just before Kat headed off to London and Tommy to college," Jason explained wearily. "I think on Tommy's part it was fear of failing another long-term relationship."

TJ's eyebrows went way up. "_Another_ long-term relationship?"

This was the first time he had heard of a relationship besides Kat involving his predecessor.

"Ah, here she is now," Jason skirted the topic by nodding in direction of the entrance. TJ turned. A petite, pretty brunette woman had just entered, wearing a white skirt with a pastel floral pattern, a short-sleeved pink turtleneck with an argyle design, and pink and white saddle shoes. To his surprise TJ recognized her a moment later.

"That's Kim Hart, isn't it? The gymnast? _She's_ a Ranger?"

"The first Pink one, yeah, with Kat as her… ah… replacement."

"So Tommy likes girls in pink?" TJ puzzled, to which the other man shrugged.

"Maybe. You have to admit though, despite how his two relationships have ended, he does have good taste," Jason noted. "A world-famous gymnast and an equally famous ballerina are not to be looked down upon as girlfriends."

"Yeah, but… why…?"

"Kim broke up with him, and in fear of a repeat experience he broke up with Kat."

TJ was more confused than ever. "But surely Kat isn't Kim?"

"Well… while Tommy and Kim made a cute couple, I think he really loved Kat which you're right, just makes things more confusing," Jason got to his feet. "I need to do a headcount. I'm here, Zack's off chasing his kids, Trini's here, Kimberly's now here, Billy's here, Tommy's here, Rocky's here, Aisha's here, Adam's here, Kat's here, Tanya's here, Justin's here, you're here, Cassie's here, Carlos is here… Ashley is not, neither are Andros and Zhane."

"I'm sure they'll be here as soon as they can," TJ defended his absent teammates. "Karone's protests probably slowed them down."

"I know, but," Jason looked uneasy. "I just want to get started already… there has been another attack in a new city every day all week. Merrick and Tommy held with some Z-Putties of all things this morning in Reefside Park."

"Z-Putties?"

"The second minions we battled," Jason explained vaguely. "Well, I hope Zack returns and your three teammates arrive soon. I know I've said this already, but I want to get this meeting started."

TJ nodded. "Right… Cassie and I dropped off Donald at Zhane and Karone's place earlier this morning, but they barely acknowledged us, they were so busy arguing."

"Maybe it is a good thing after all that Emily doesn't know," Jason mused. TJ noted, "Yeah, but isn't it hard keeping that kind of secret from her?"

Jason was quiet for a minute while around them all the Rangers caught up. At length he replied softly, "Yeah, yeah it is."

Billy had observed that Tommy, Kim, and Kat were all ignoring the presence of the other two. So he rolled his eyes and corralled the trio and dragged them over to a quieter corner of the club. Folding his arms across the chest he informed them, "All right, you three have managed to avoid this for the past thirteen years but today we have to deal with it if we're going to be united against Ivan Ooze. Kimberly: that letter was not nice at all, even if you were trying to let him down softly. A letter? Even with my limited knowledge of social skills I know that is inappropriate. Apologize and explain yourself to the poor guy! Hasn't Tommy been through enough already?"

Kimberly's jaw dropped but Billy moved onto the guy of the trio before she could come up with a response.

"Tommy: everyone down to the Putties knew that you and Kat were crushing on one another, and clearly continue to do so as implied by your utter lack of a dating life. So tell Kat how you feel and explain yourself about the break-up."

Tommy's cheeks turned as red as one of his Red Ranger suits as Billy focused his intense blue gaze on the final member of the issue.

"Kat: you should have tried to talk Tommy out of breaking up with you. You knew perfectly well that Tommy's ego is not as healthy or as strong as it should be for a legend of his stature. And don't bother denying your feelings towards him; I know perfectly well you haven't glanced twice at a guy since you two broke up. Furthermore, you two have a strong connection that the other returned that I envied. Could you two agree to give one another a second chance? Considering TJ and Cassie; Leo and Kendrix; Carter and Dana; Wes and Jen; technically Sky and Syd; and Mack and Rose I think you'll find it worth the risk."

Kat just gulped and stared wide-eyed at the Blue Power Ranger. Throwing his arms up into the air he exclaimed, "Just get it over with!" before walking off.

"Uh…" Kim scuffed the ground with her foot awkwardly. "Honestly, the main reason I broke up with Tommy was that I knew you were falling in love with Kat. If I had tried to do it over the phone or in person I knew I'd end up yelling at you to just get with her already."

"Er… okay, Kim." Tommy told Kat, "I really wish I had waited for you… you would have been worth every second of the wait."

"I did have a boyfriend or two before moving to the States," she reminded him. "And, well, I mean… Tommy…"

"This conversation would probably go much easier if I wasn't around. I give you crazy kids my blessing," an amused and relived Kimberly grinned before bouncing off. Tommy looked after her.

"Yeah… more of a sister than anything else."

"Did she seriously just bounce off?" Kat was more pragmatic. Tommy noted, "Eh, it's Kim. She can bounce off the walls if she wants to."

Kat barely heard Tommy through her pounding heart. It was true; she still loved Tommy Oliver, and she was hitting the phase in her life where she was starting to want to settle down. Besides, after thirty even the best ballerinas started to get fewer plum roles. Although valid, only the first reason really mattered.

"Tommy?" she whispered, turning to face him. He shifted to look at her and said, "Look, I love you but I mean, should we take it slow or not? You know, get to know one another all over again. It has been thirteen years. I mean, you're a famous ballerina now while I'm just a high science teacher."

"I guess you're right… uh, in the e-mail this Hayley mentioned you being a _five_-time Ranger?" Kat noted bemusedly. "So you went at it again?"

"In my defense, I _was_ content being the mentor but then I got kidnapped and one thing led to another… Black," he beamed, dropping the pretense of embarrassment. "It was so awesome! Although technically with Conner and Trent there were three of me on a team, with Ethan as Billy and Kira as a mix of you, Kim, and Tanya. Maybe mostly Tanya and you but she did have Kim's spunk…"

Kat raised her eyebrows; Tommy added hurriedly, "Not that you don't have spunk, but Kim is a lot more blatant about it and well, she can get very wry if needed, like Kira. And it's not like I still have romantic feelings for Kim; in fact I don't think I ever had romantic feelings for her but I got confused since as a fifteen-year-old how was I supposed to know that you really could be just friends with a girl? Especially a cute one; but you're cuter. Well, really you're beautiful, but um… yeah. And people wonder why Bridge rambles."

Tommy gave himself a Gibbs-slap. Kat smiled but had to ask, "Who's Bridge?"

"Oh, he's the only Ranger since the Turbo era to have had three morphers but he started out a Green Ranger like me."

"Ah," Kat giggled. Tommy scratched the back of his neck. "So… want to check out the Dino Lair? It's where me and Hayley mentored Dino Thunder; and don't worry, Hayley is just a friend. She's like a baby sister to me. You're the only girl I've ever loved."

"Oh?"

Tommy nodded, his faded blush coming back in full force. "Yeah. I love you."

Kat gently kissed him on the lips, both of them pleased to realize that their chemistry was as strong as ever. Pulling back she whispered, "I love you too. And I would love to see the Dino Lair."

Tommy's face lit up.

Just then Jason yelled, "All right, Zack has dealt with his kids via getting Bulk and Skull to watch them-"

The returned Zack smirked.

"And now that the last of the first eighteen are here we can begin the council!" Jason wrapped up. He then muttered under his breath, "About time too."

As they left the corner Tommy and Kat did see that there were three new people in the courtyard of Club Bulkmeier: a woman with honey brown hair and a bright smile in a yellow tank top and off-white capris; a serious-looking man with dark brown hair with light blond streaks in it wearing an impressive red cloak over a white long-sleeved shirt, a red pull-on vest, and khaki pants; a smiling man with platinum blond hair in a grey shirt and pants.

Once everyone had taken their seats at the round table, from most senior to most junior, the council began, in the bustle no one noticing a bush that had just sneezed, and a pair of 'bless yous' from the wall. Then a surprised silence from the trio of voices that swiftly became a normal silence when Jason spoke.


	7. Chapter 7: The Council

Hi. All right, time for some more establishing of the plot. I promise it'll pick up plot-wise after chapter 10. Also happy Thanksgiving.

I don't own anything you recognize. Reviews _would_ be nice (best cute face).

* * *

**Chapter Seven: The Council**

"All right, let's face it. The world is in danger again."

"Like it is every year," Zack noted. Jason gave Zack a Gibbs-slap, which was easy to do since Zack was sitting to his left. Zack gave Tommy a dour look. "You're been letting him watch _NCIS_ again, haven't you?"

But Tommy was too dazedly blissful over being Kat's boyfriend again to care, so Zack had to settle for glowering at Jason and muttering under his breath. Jason rolled his eyes and resumed his talk. "But this time is different. Ivan Ooze has escaped, and he's brought back a lot of bad guys; near as we can gauge one notable villain from each team as well as a way of making the minions from all the teams."

"He's made his base at the moon fortress," Adam noted. Andros asked, "So why can't we do what we did last time someone tried to revive the moon fortress as a place for evil? Rally a group of Rangers and battle them."

Jason shook his head. "Last time was a small group of Machine Empire generals with some minions trying to dig up Lord Zedd's Zord, Andros. This time it is a former evil emperor-cum-sorcerer who wants to take over and/or destroy the world, who has amassed a fairly large group of second-in-commands along with a veritable army of minions."

"Ivan Ooze… I think I've come across that name in my research," Justin commented. Billy nodded. "So have I but I'd like to get your thoughts on the subject."

"Well…" Justin began. "From what I've read he had a sizable empire in this galaxy roughly seven thousand years ago. Then he tried to conquer Earth… a sage (we can all guess who) rallied a team of teenagers who managed to seal him away in a metallic egg."

"But due to construction that egg surfaced and Ivan escaped," Adam brought Ivan's escapades up to date. Justin nodded, "From what I read he was a master shape-shifter and was a fairly powerful sorcerer in other areas as well. He isn't much for one-on-one combat but can rally up monsters and minions to fight for him."

"Like he did," Billy noted. "A wide range of monsters and minions that are already attacking the cities formerly defended by Power Rangers, and they will only keep coming."

There was a lull while everyone thought this over. TJ frowned, "What about Terra Venture? I know they're almost on the other side of the galaxy but will Ivan go after them as well?"

Billy shook his head. "Negative; he's focusing on Earth like most villains. Earth is 'the one that got away' to him; he wants to get it this time around."

"Uh-oh," murmured Carlos. Rocky noted, "So that means Angel Grove, Mariner Bay, Silver Hills, Turtle Cove, Blue Bay Harbor, Reefside, possibly Newtech City, Briarwood, San Angeles, Ocean Bluff, and maybe that out-there new city are all under attack."

"Not Newtech City and the city of the previous team," Billy refuted. "Ivan will want to stick to conquering the Earth of this dimension."

"At least until he conquers this Earth," Andros observed soberly. "There are just eighteen of us… and easily just as many main underlings under Ivan Ooze. Add the minions to the mix and we have a recipe to match the destruction that almost ended the world in 1998."

The six Space Rangers exchanged troubled, uneasy looks as this revelation sunk in. Tommy argued, "But we're not alone."

"Right," Adam backed up his friend. "I know for a fact that Ninja Storm through Operation Overdrive would leap at the chance to help."

Jason, TJ, Tommy, and Andros thought back on Leo, Carter, Wes, Eric, and Cole. Surely their fellow Reds could rally their teams in preparation for the greatest battle the Power had seen since the end of the Dark Days. Jason exhaled, "All right; so on next Saturday we'll rally together all the Power Rangers and get them in on the act. We'll need their help."

"They'll probably want to help," Trini observed. "Besides, Earth is under their protection as well as ours."

"It's just that they're also under our protection since we're the most senior Rangers," Tanya noted. Trini conceded, "The first six of us especially… we're the first."

"Affirmative," Billy nodded, leaning forward slightly. "So I should wrap up that program so that all the morphers can access the morphing grid?"

"Finish?" puzzled the seven most junior Rangers while the other nine of the first ten hid smiles and chuckles. Acting as an intermediary Tanya told them, "It's Billy. He was the to-go guy for technology and whatnot for the first four years of Power Rangers."

Billy refuted, "What? I made a simpler version to be used during your little adventure, Adam. That's how you, Tori, Kira, and Bridge could use your morphers all at once."

"What about Xander's?"

"Mystic Force's morphers are… unique. I keep trying to get Kim to introduce me to their mentors."

Kim rolled her eyes. "No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Please?"

"He's using your old trick," Aisha noted. Kimberly glowered at her friend. "I noticed."

"So… is that a yes?"

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Stop it you two," Jason ordered the pair. "Let's focus and divide up the tasks. Billy, just do that morpher-calibrating thing you have to do. Tommy and Adam, alert the younger teams about the issue. TJ and Andros, you two can alert Lost Galaxy through Wild Force because I don't think Merrick has recovered yet from his surprise encounter with Princess Shayla."

"Huh?" Rocky puzzled. "What?"

"Merrick is in love with her but is in denial about it," Tommy gave Rocky the shortened and simplified version.

"Ah, okay."

Jason noted, "Maybe we should show a clip show of all the Ranger adventures thus far just so everyone doesn't have to recap everything to everyone else."

"That would be useful," Justin nodded. "I could do that."

"Great, thanks for volunteering."

Justin just grinned, looking forward to the project.

"But what can the rest of us do?" asked Cassie. Jason sighed, "Be on the look-out, I suppose, and be ready to be saying, 'hi, my name is' a lot on next Saturday."

"So…" Tommy looked around for a clock. "Are we done now?"

"I think so," Jason shrugged. "Why?"

Tommy looked over hopefully at Kat, who grinned at him. Next thing the other sixteen knew the pair was gone from Club Bulkmeier. Billy observed, "I should have lectured them a decade ago…"

"No kidding," Kimberly grinned lopsidedly. She tousled his hair. "Good going, Billy."

He smiled happily. Aisha leaned back in her chair. "So we just chill, and talk about the good old days, and eat lunch, and then go home to prep to save the world again?"

"Pretty much," Zhane nodded. "Ah, it's good to be back in action!"

"The world is in danger," Andros reminded his best friend. Zhane rolled his eyes. "The world is in a danger a lot, which is why we keep having to save it. Stop stressing out, Andros, we haven't failed before."

"We almost did once."

"Multiple times, really," Tanya recalled. Trini argued, "But each time we did manage to save the world, so stop worrying. Besides, there'll be a lot more of us this time around so we'll be able to put up a stronger fight than ever before."

"But that's only because Ivan will presumably give us the greatest challenge any Ranger has faced," Adam fretted. Rocky reminded his friend, "It'll be okay, we're the Power Rangers after all."

"I know but still…"

…

About one o'clock that afternoon Tommy's Jeep pulled into the driveway of his house just outside of the city of Reefside, Kat's pink car right behind him. Getting out of the Jeep, Tommy hoped that Kat would like his home. He liked his home but he didn't know if Kat would.

"Wow, this is a nice place, Tommy," Kat noted as she followed him up onto the front porch. Tommy smiled in happy relief as he got out the key to the front door but when he inserted the key he found the door already unlocked.

"Uh… that can't be good."  
"Nope… my old students are here."

"Oh… the rest of Dino Thunder?"

"Yeah," Tommy exhaled as he opened the door. He called into the hallway, "Guys? It's me!"

"Dude, Dr. O.!" came a male voice. Tommy replied, "Conner, what have I told you about saying dude?"

"We said 'dude' when we were younger."

"Shush, don't tell Conner that."

"Die, goblins, die!" came a second male voice.

Kat's eyes grew wide so Tommy had to reassure her.

"That's just Ethan playing a computer game."

"Just playing a computer game?"

"It's Ethan."

Kat looked dubious so Tommy defended them, "They're good kids! Although it's a little weird… I think I'm their version of Zordon, which freaks me out to no end…"

"You're their Zordon?"

"Well, I was their mentor…"

"I bet you did a great job."

Tommy shrugged uneasily. "Good enough…"

A woman's voice came from the kitchen. "Would you two stop this already!"

"Never!" both male voices responded. Tommy puzzled, "Huh, if Kira's here Trent ought to be here too but he's not."

"How can you tell he's not?"

"He wouldn't let Conner and Ethan mess with his girlfriend."

"Ah."

Tommy and Kat entered the kitchen. Ethan was in fact playing a computer game on his laptop, with Conner sitting next to him and watching on. But in the third chair at the kitchen table was Kira wrapped up in toilet paper. She looked like a mummy, with only her eyes and mouth visible. Tommy looked over at the guys.

"What in the name of the moon fortress happened?"

"Revenge for what the other Yellows did to us Reds during the pizza party."

"There was a pizza party?"

"You don't know everything that goes on the Power Rangers subculture, Dr. O.," Ethan retorted. Today he was wearing a blue T-shirt with Sonic the Hedgehog on it with his jeans. Conner was wearing a red golf shirt and jeans. Kira's outfit was hidden under layers of toilet paper.

Dr. O. groaned, "That is my toilet paper wrapped around Kira, isn't it?"

"Actually, for once, it's not," Conner beamed. "Nick gave it to us via magic. It's magically reinforced so Kira can't free herself."

Kira tried narrowed her eyes at Conner. "I am going to kill you when I'm free."

Conner and Ethan exchanged a look. "Nah."

"You three are crazy," Dr. O. sighed. "Come on, Kat, I'll show you the Dino Lair and get us away from these absurd teens."

"Hey!"

"You got yourself wrapped up in toilet paper, Kira. Right now you count as an absurd teen."

Hiding a laugh Kat followed Tommy through a door and down a flight of stairs into the tawny stone Dino Lair, which had high tech technology in the walls. Looking around she commented, "Wow, Tommy, this is a great headquarters."

"It did a good job," Tommy acknowledged. Sitting down at the computer consul Tommy asked, "So do you have anything particular you want to do?"

She smiled softly at him. "Just to get you all over again."

"Yeah, me too."

…

That afternoon, all of the remaining Angel Grove Rangers had left at last. Bulk and Skull were serving the new influx of customers. A head poked out of the bush that had sneezed earlier. He had leaves stuck in his dark afro, and he had bark-brown skin. He protested, "About time!"

"Yeah," concurred the other two voices as their speakers materialized. One was Rose, Mack's girlfriend, wearing a pink and black halter dress with combat boots. The other was a tawny-skinned man with fluffy black hair wearing a white T-shirt with black jeans.

"I'm Trent and this is Rose."

"And I'm Max. I saw Rose on TV three years ago, so I'm guessing you're both Rangers like me," the guy noted as he disentangled himself from the bush. Max wore a blue T-shirt under an orange turtleneck with off-white pants.

"Blue?" Trent hazarded. Max nodded as he brushed leaves off of his clothes, "Uh-huh. I'm guessing you're either Black or White while Rose is Pink."

"Yes, I'm Pink and he's White."

"Wild Force."

"Dino Thunder."

"Operation Overdrive."

"Want to get some smoothies and try to figure out the puzzle with what each of us know?" Max offered. Rose admitted, "That sounds like a good idea."

"Sure."

"But everyone is on their own as far as buying smoothies goes… writing adventure novellas like the Baron series do not pay as well as you think they might."

"You're the author of the Baron series? My boyfriend Mack, the Red Overdrive Ranger, loves those books!"

"Really? Huh," Max blushed slightly out of delight. "You'll have to introduce us next Saturday then."

"Right," Rose agreed. Trent noted, "Okay, we can trade personal information later. Right now I want to piece together the whole picture or at least as much of the whole picture that we know about to see what's what."

"Good idea," Max nodded.

So the trio headed over to the tiki bar to get some smoothies from Bulk and Skull.


	8. Chapter 8: Rangers in the Middle

Yes, yes. I've been gone for a while… I'm sorry. But here's an update anyhow!

* * *

**Chapter Eight: Rangers in the Middle**

It was the day after the first eighteen's council, the sun sinking into the distant ocean. Twenty-five people were in the spacious grounds behind the Collins mansion in Silver Hills, sitting on various items or simply standing. Their hosts, a golden-haired man in navy slacks and jacket with a red long-sleeved shirt and a slender brunette woman in black slacks and a pink blouse, hung back as the others talked among themselves prior to their meeting beginning.

At length a brown-haired, fair-skinned man in a red T-shirt, jeans, and a black bomber jacket came up to the former. He commented, "Wes, we ought to be getting started."

"I know, Leo," Wes conceded. Next to him his wife let out an ear-piercing whistle that got everyone's attention. She smiled at her husband. "They're all yours."

Leo and Wes just looked at her for a moment.

"Thanks, Jen," Wes replied at length, kissing her on the cheek before stepping forward. As one of the two heads of Bio-tech he was used to speaking to far larger groups.

"I'm Wes Collins, the Red Time Force Ranger. Behind me are my wife, Jen Scotts the Pink Time Force Ranger, and the most senior Red here, Leo Corbett, the Red Galaxy Ranger."

Leo's six teammates felt obliged to cheer a bit. Leo just smiled sheepishly in response. Afterwards Wes continued, "Some odd things have been going on lately… minions attacking cities where there have been Rangers but never the city the minions originally attacked. Now, apparently Earth is in deep trouble or something, because Princess Shayla is awake and is serving as baby-sitter to our kids right now."

With a yelp Merrick slipped off the bench he had been sitting on. His teammates just gave him amused but firm glances.

Everyone had heard something of the legend of Animaria, and thus was appropriately concerned. Looking pointedly at the Lunar Wolf Taylor spoke up, saying, "Plus Merrick gave me and Eric a little visit. If he's poking into our business with minimal prodding things MUST be bad."

The rest of Wild Force and all of Time Force backed up the Yellow Eagle Ranger, via nodding and troubled frowns of agreement. Merrick just sulked and remained on the ground, dressed in a white T-shirt and grey pants. A sandy-haired man in a red shirt and brown slacks noted, "Could whatever threat we're facing reopen the demon world?"

"That would be bad," observed a wiry man with dishwater blond hair and blue-grey eyes in a grey shirt and khaki pants. His sister, who had cornflower blue eyes and golden hair, gave him a barely bemused look. "Coming from you, that's an understatement, Ryan."

"Dana," the red-clad man warned her gently, overlaying her left hand with his. She smiled sadly at her husband. "You know I'm right."

"I know."

A man with tanned skin and gelled black hair in a blue turtleneck sweater and jeans observed, "Wes, what if this guy couldn't just revive minions but could also revive monsters and possibly even villains?"

A chocolate-skinned woman with curly brown-black hair gave him a one-armed hug that still squeezed the breath out of him.

"Relax, Lucas. Both Ransik and Nadira are good now!"

"Lucas is thinking about Frax, Katie," chimed in a lean man with neon green hair. He wore a baggy green hoodie and white slacks. Katie loosened her grip on Lucas.

"Oh…"

Wes looked over at Eric. "You want to add anything, Eric?"

"Sure. How did Max's spying mission go?"

Max sat up a little straighter out of pride. A woman with slightly tanned skin and curly brown hair asked in puzzlement, "What spying mission?"

A cheerful woman with silky blond hair in black slacks with a black and pink striped T-shirt informed her, "Remember? My big brother is the Red Space Ranger and my husband is the Silver Space Ranger- numbers seventeen and eighteen of the first eighteen. So I got wind of the council they were holding, and contacted Leo."

"And Leo contacted me, Wes, and Cole," Carter added. "Then we and Eric decided we needed to hold a little meeting of our own. But first we decided to send in Max to find out what our predecessors have been holding back from us."

Max got up from where he was sitting next to his best friend, Danny Delgado. The Hispanic man with clipped black hair and wire frame glasses dressed in a black shirt and khaki pants was the Black Bison Ranger like he was the Blue Shark Ranger. Today Max wore a blue long-sleeved shirt and jeans. Once he was standing with Leo, Wes, and Jen he began.

"I got into Club Bulkimeir no problem; same with the hiding. I might have slacked off a bit while everyone was arriving in the club but when they got down to business so did I."

"And?" nudged the woman who had asked about the spying mission. She wore a yellow tank top and black capris. Ryan commented, "Relax, Kelsey. I'm sure Max is about to explain what he had learned to us."

Now, as the most junior Ranger in the group having been a paltry seventeen when he was a Ranger, Max was enjoying all the attention even as he was aware that it was because of his 'guppy' status among them that he had been 'asked' to check in on what the **really** senior Rangers were up to. So there was a slight pause just to show off his power, but before anyone could get irritable Max spoke.

"First and foremost they threw around the name of our new threat quite freely: Ivan Ooze."

Dressed in a pink sundress, a petite woman with soft blonde hair and wire frame glasses frowned. "The Galaxy Book mentions him repeatedly."

Leo looked over at his wife, who had been the Pink Galaxy Ranger prior to Karone. "Really, Kendrix?"

She nodded. "Apparently he had had a sizable galactic empire until seven thousand years when he decided to add Earth to his collection. The sage of Eltar rallied a team of younglings who managed to confine him."

A man with shaggy brown hair and fair skin in a red shirt and jeans whistled. "The sage of Eltar? Didn't Jason, Tommy, TJ, and Andros all mention him as one of their idols?"

"Yeah," Eric folded his arms across his chest as he spoke to his wife's Red. "Zordon was the original Ranger mentor… and perhaps also before as well as in modern times. But he died."

There was a sorrowful silence for several minutes as everyone thought back on Zordon. Karone in particular hunched her shoulders and even sniffled once or twice, well aware of her inadvertent role in the great sage's sacrifice. Kendrix, remembering her own sacrifice, gently squeezed her successor's shoulder. At length a woman with wavy, long brown hair in a belly-baring yellow top and a yellow skirt as well as no shoes asked, "But what can this Ivan do?"

Max shrugged uneasily. "They didn't really go into specifics- just that he was a shape-shifter and some sort of sorcerer."

"Oh." She looked over at Kendrix, her best friend. Kendrix sighed, "Maya, I didn't realize that we'd be facing Ivan so I didn't read those sections that closely."

Maya's husband, a shaven man with dark brown skin in an oil-streaked green T-shirt and black slacks, had to smile and rest his head on her shoulder. An olive-skinned man with slightly wavy black hair in an indigo long-sleeved shirt and black slacks asked Max, "What else did you hear?"

"They are planning to bring us in on the action," Max assured Leo's older brother. "As well as the more junior Rangers."

A murmur of surprise went through the Rangers; none of them had really met anyone past Wild Force. Well, except for Max but he was holding that bit of information back as a sort of trump card. "I have no doubt that within twenty-four hours we'll be getting an e-mail telling us where and when the Power Ranger reunion will be going on. Well, the general when is this coming Saturday I think but they didn't mention any specifics that I can recall."

Wes asked, "I'm curious, Max. Why not-"

Max cheekily overrode the more senior Ranger. "Andros also asked why they couldn't do what they did in 2002- right down to attacking the moon fortress where Ivan Ooze has apparently made home base. Jason shot down that idea; this time around is on a much bigger scale. Besides even if that did happen it'd probably be us Blues' turn."

Lucas had to chuckle, as did the two Asian-descended men who had been Blues before either of them. One had a longer face and wore a blue shirt with an orca design on it with indigo capris; the other had tawnier skin and a wirier build as well as wore a buttoned-up blue long-sleeved shirt and black slacks. A man who had an almost shaven head and dark brown skin wearing a green and white checkered long-sleeved shirt with jeans laughed, "Hey, what about us Greens?"

The Blue with the orca shirt noted, "Blue existed before Green, Joel."

"Still, Chad," grumbled Joel. Carter looked over at his teammates almost wearily, making Kelsey and Dana giggle while Ryan seemed relieved to be uninvolved.

Wes raised his eyebrows at Cole, who shrugged mildly. More strict, Taylor pressed Max, "Did you learn anything else?"

"Um… Tommy and Kat got back together…" Max began to list. "Zack has hyper kids… Kimberly somehow knows the Mystic Force team… Billy has a program or a device to get all our morphers to be able to work within the same timeframe… there was a lot of catching up that went on after the meeting went down…"

Max and the junior two Rangers had agreed not to share the most senior Rangers' concerns about the battle's outcome. That would be going too far in terms of invading their privacy.

"Oh, and they decided that Terra Venture, Newtech City, and some other place even they're unsure about aren't in any direct danger."

Lost Galaxy collectively sighed in relief. Taylor folded her arms across her chest.

"And?"

Max tried to look as cute as possible, which was getting hard now that he was twenty-five, ironically older than any of the other Rangers when they had become Rangers (with the exception of Merrick, of course).

"And what?"

"What aren't you telling us?"

Max studied his fingernails intently. "Just that we're not the only ones to have had the idea of checking out what the first eighteen were up to."

All was silent for a moment. Then the White Tiger Ranger of Max's team, a tawny-skinned woman with soft brown hair in a pink pleated skirt and a white blouse asked, "Who else had that idea?"

"Well, Alyssa, the more junior Rangers apparently recently all got together for an epic pizza party but afterwards they elected two Rangers to go check out the council meeting. They had an easier time of it," Max observed. "Trent had a camouflage ability while Rose could go invisible."

"Camouflage?" questioned the most senior Blue present. Max half-shrugged, "Like a chameleon, Kai, he could blend into the background."

"So?" Eric pressed.

Max beamed, "Hey, they're Power Rangers like us. They all want to help kick butt too… especially since it hasn't been all that long ago for some of them."

Wes checked his wristwatch. "It's starting to get a little late. How about we all head inside? If it's not ready now, I'm sure dinner will be ready within a half-hour. I think we've covered the main points we needed to cover anyway."

Leo nodded, commenting, "We can talk more about this Ivan Ooze and everything else then too."

So the Rangers all trickled into the Collins mansion. But looking over her shoulder Alyssa saw Merrick easily jumping to the top of the surrounding wall before leaping down beyond the Collins grounds. With a sad expression on her face Alyssa followed her remaining teammates inside, hoping that no one would mention to the Princess that Merrick had in fact been present but wasn't any more.

I _knew_ I had forgotten something… I still don't own the Power Rangers.


	9. Chapter 9: Rally to Reefside I

Disclaimer: If I owned the Power Rangers… you would know about it! Ergo, I do not.

Now the chaos really is starting to come about!

* * *

**Chapter Nine: Rally to Reefside, Part One**

On the week-long anniversary of the council of the first eighteen Tommy Oliver puttered around his kitchen before the sun was up, making coffee so that he could fully awaken. Sleepily he poured the freshly made coffee into his 'best mentor' mug Conner had given him last Christmas; as he did so he heard a yawn coming from his living room. Remembering that Kat had slept over on his couch last night Tommy went over to the doorframe and leaned on it, happy to watch her slowly wake up while waiting for his coffee to cool.

Her hair was mussed up and she wore a pink tank top under an unbuttoned cream man's pajama top with matching pants. Sitting up she first yawned, then smiled at her boyfriend.

"Morning."

"Morning," Tommy responded. "Today is the big day when all the teams meet all the other teams. It'll be chaotic for a bit."

"Crikey, that's an understatement." Kat's Aussie accent was always a bit stronger when she wasn't fully awake. Tommy just sipped his coffee, which was still a bit warmer than he would like so he didn't take a second sip.

"It's still pretty warm but there's coffee."

Kat inhaled. "Yeah, I can smell it."

"You could go get dressed while it cools," Tommy suggested. He looked down at his green sweatpants and white undershirt. "Actually I ought to do that myself."

Kat smiled at him. "I don't see anything wrong with your current outfit."

Tommy just sputtered, a blush creeping up his stubble-covered cheeks. Getting off the couch Kat walked over to her boyfriend and kissed him on the mouth.

"You're so cute, Tommy."

The second Pink Ranger grabbed her duffel bag and went into the bathroom to change before Tommy's mind could come up with a response. So he left his mug on the counter to cool while he went upstairs to get changed. When he came downstairs, now in a green buttoned shirt and khaki pants, he found Kat pouring a mug of coffee for herself. She wore a pink T-shirt and khaki capris. Tommy came up from behind and hugged her. Resting his chin on her shoulder he commented softly, "Yep, I'm definitely an idiot. I've been put under one too many evil spells or something."

"Oh?"

"Why else would I decide to miss out on thirteen years of this?" Tommy observed, hugging her closer. Kat informed him, "In that case, I'm just as much of an idiot as you."

"You, an idiot? Hah."

Kat opted to finish pouring her coffee rather than responding. The pair was sitting at the kitchen table, sipping their coffee and eating instant oatmeal when Conner and Ethan entered the kitchen. The chestnut-haired young man was wearing a red polo shirt and stone-washed jeans today. With a grin he teased his mentor, "Did you have a late night, Dr. O.?"

Ethan, who was wearing a jean jacket with an indigo T-shirt and jeans, snickered. Tommy glowered at his old students. "We've only been back together for a week."

"Just remember when the time comes you have four ready-made baby-sitters," Ethan noted. Conner dismissed this notion, saying, "This is Dr. O. we're talking about. He won't remember."

"True, very true."

Tommy just rolled his eyes while Kat hid a smile.

"Where are Kira and Trent?"

"Sucking face in their car," Ethan predicted. "I mean, they were right behind us while we were on the road…"

"I think I spotted the JKP Jeep in Reefside," Conner recalled. "Maybe the Jungle Fury team will show up soon…"

"I'm hungry," Ethan changed the subject. Conner nodded, "Me too."

Again Tommy rolled his eyes. "Go ahead, raid my fridge."

"You're the best," Ethan informed the five-time Ranger as he and Conner headed towards the sticky note covered fridge. Kat raised an eyebrow at Tommy.

"They like to raid my fridge," he shrugged. "These two especially."

Just then there came a knock from the front door. Bringing along his coffee mug for moral support Tommy made his way there and opened the door to reveal five people.

There was a sandy-haired young man in a red V-neck sweater and black slacks; a short black-haired Asian man in a blue and black checkered shirt with crisp jeans; a beaming young woman with dark golden hair in a yellow pleated skirt and a lime green halter top; a man with shaggy brown hair and stubble wearing white pants and a violet sweatshirt; and a man with clipped dirty blonde hair in a white T-shirt and jeans. The second-to-last person waved.

"Hi, Tommy. I guess you wouldn't remember me…"

"Yes, I do," Tommy refuted, remembering the summer between his freshman and sophomore year. "Which surprises even me, I admit."

_One July day he and the other five Rangers had been hanging out in Billy's garage, working on new tactics to defeat Rita's minions when a cerulean van pulled into the driveway. Billy had seemed puzzled._

"_That has the appearance of Uncle Bruce's automobile."_

"_Your mom's sister had married him, right?" Kim asked. Billy nodded, pushing up his glasses, "Affirmative. I wonder why he has arrived… Dad hadn't mentioned him coming."_

_A young boy with floppy brown hair in a violet T-shirt and overalls dashed out of the van and ran up to Billy._

"_Hi, Billy!"_

"_Salutations, Robert."_

"_It's RJ."_

_Billy remained dubious as he introduced the newcomer, "This is Robert, my younger cousin. He prefers to be referred to as RJ."_

_The boy beamed at them. "Hi! Billy has told me lots about you guys- and how there are actual superheroes in Angel Grove now! Someday I want to be a Power Ranger…"_

"_It could genetic," Kimberly, his then-girlfriend, had whispered into his ear as RJ continued to talk. "So maybe RJ _will_ end up being a Power Ranger when he's double his current age or so."_

_At the time he had simply shrugged._

"You did end up being a Power Ranger," Tommy noted. RJ grinned. "Yeah. And it was epic."

"We're still all shocked that RJ's cousin was the original Blue Power Ranger," the short guy, who was clearly the Blue Jungle Fury Ranger, observed. The Red Jungle Fury Ranger pointed out, "I think it's okay we didn't have two of you on a team, Theo."

Conner poked his head out of the kitchen. "Hey, Casey and Casey's teammates! Come on back, me and Ethan are raiding Dr. O.'s fridge!"

"Ethan and I are raiding, not me and Ethan," Tommy corrected Conner. The Red Dino Ranger just grinned, "Dude, you're a science teacher, not an English teacher!"

"Still." Tommy turned back to the Jungle Fury team. "Feel free to raid my fridge; I'll just wheedle some money out of some of my Ranger friends later."

"Thanks!" beamed the Yellow Jungle Fury Ranger as she and three of her teammates ran back to join Conner and Ethan. Simply stepping into the front hallway RJ told Tommy, "Casey is Red, Theo is Blue, Lily is Yellow, I'm Violet, and Dom is White."

"Cool. Conner and Ethan are the Red and Blue Dino Rangers respectively. Kat's here too; she has had three Pink morphers."

RJ looked semi-sheepish. "If you don't mind me asking…"

"What?" Tommy asked, his guard going up.

"Who are the two in the white car making out in your driveway?"

"Tyrannodrones… Ethan was right."

Before RJ could question Tommy further a jet-like sound roared just above the house, landing in the backyard.

"Hm… from what I know, that'll be the Operation Overdrive team in their SHARC."

"SHARC?"

"I don't know the acronym… ask Billy. He fell asleep in the Dino Lair last night, working on some project. Don't worry, I covered him up with a brown blanket."

"Any other overnight visitors?"

"Just Merrick… he offered to take the couch so Kat could have the guest bedroom but since he's been more or less living here for the past three years we decided to let him keep it. Ah, speak of the Ranger!"

Merrick staggered sleepily down the stairs, wearing just a pair of grey sweatpants. Looking around blearily he queried, "Where's the Org?"

"No Orgs, just a team of Rangers making a noisy arrival," Tommy assured the other Ranger. "Merrick, this is RJ. RJ, this is Merrick. You two should get along, since you're both Wolf Rangers. And Merrick, go get dressed. We have company!"

With a grumpy growl Merrick made his way back up the stairs while Tommy led RJ to the kitchen where the junior Rangers were all sitting on various countertops as they ate. Suddenly a fair-skinned man with curly light brown hair dressed in a red unbuttoned shirt over a white T-shirt with khaki pants entered through the unlocked back door.

"Um… hi? Is this Tommy Oliver's house? Oh, hey, Conner and Casey. Yeah, we're here." He turned back for a moment to call in his teammates, and amused Tommy watched the junior team come in… hang on, there were two teams coming in. Apparently his confusion was obvious because Conner explained, "Operation Overdrive has been hosting last year's team, RPM. They're from a dimension so distant they're the equivalent of you and the first five."

Seven of the newcomers blushed furiously, so Tommy guessed they were RPM. Plus he recognized the six Operation Overdrive Power Rangers from their TV interview and their descriptions he had gotten from Adam and Kira. Mack was the one in charge; the lean chocolate-skinned man with dreadlocks dressed in a formal black shirt and pants was Will; the guy with pale skin, almond eyes, and fluffy black hair in a blue tank top and jeans was Dax; the woman in a yellow blouse and brown shorts with gold hair that had tawny streaks was Ronny; the petite Hispanic woman in a black T-shirt, pink capris, and combat boots was Rose; and the guy with shoulder-length blonde hair in an orange T-shirt and baggy grey pants was Tyzonn.

More curiously Tommy looked over these RPM Rangers, about whom even Billy knew little. Five of them wore leather jacket with colorful details corresponding to their Ranger colors, while the remaining two- twins from the looks of things- wore black jumpsuits with gold and silver trim. But before he could take a long look at any of them a petite, fair-skinned girl pushed her way forward, dressed in what looked like a boarding school uniform in indigo along with a massive white cloak with its hood down. In one hand she carried a metallic briefcase. Tommy looked down at her.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Dr. K, mentor to RPM."

"Hi. I'm Tommy Oliver, but most of the junior teams call me Dr. O. What's the K short for?"

She looked at him oddly. "It's not short for anything."

"Really? Why not?"

Dr. K looked at his green shirt, then back at the Ranger wearing the green-detailed jacket, who was already raiding the cookie jar. He had curly brown hair, an elfin face, and a scrawny build. Besides the jacket he wore a green T-shirt and jeans. When he noticed Dr. K staring at him he protested, "Everyone else is eating the food!"

Dr. K redirected her gaze on Tommy. She exhaled, "You're part-Green, aren't you?"

"Yeah, I was the first Green Ranger of this dimension… the first White Ranger too."

Conner bragged, "Plus he's the only Ranger to have had two Red morphers and he's one of the few Black Rangers. _And_ the first mentor to also be a Ranger… a pattern more or less unbroken until you came along. Of course, he's also the only Ranger to have had FIVE morphers. No one has had even four… although there are several Rangers who have had three."

"Me among them," Kat pointed out. Ronny added, "Don't forget Bridge!"

Operation Overdrive all grinned, and having met Bridge Conner, Ethan, and Jungle Fury all did the same. Tommy looked bemused, knowing he had met Bridge but only he himself and Trent had memories of the encounter. While Operation Overdrive and RPM performed their own raid on the kitchen Tommy took a closer look at the latter team.

He didn't bother looking over K or the Green Ranger too closely, but the Red Ranger did remind him a lot of Jason when he was younger. He wore jeans and a red T-shirt; he had light coffee-hued skin and a slight afro. The Blue Ranger was tall and broad, and Tommy thought he detected a Scottish brogue when he spoke. Yep, definitely Scottish. He had dark blonde hair and a pleasant, open face.

The Yellow and Black Rangers seemed extra close… hm. The former had corn silk colored hair and was quite pretty, wearing a yellow T-shirt and jeans, while the latter had floppy dark brown hair with fair skin. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans.

Then there were the Gold and Silver Rangers, who looked an awful lot alike with jet black hair, almond eyes, and an energetic bounce to every step. Under their cotton zipped up jackets they wore white undershirts.

Curiously he asked, "You guys always dress a lot alike or what?"

"We're wearing our uniforms," the Red Ranger shrugged. Theo paused in his grape-eating, horrified. "We were supposed to wear our uniforms to this meeting? OH NO!"

"We didn't," Mack pointed out. Ethan beamed, "And we don't have a one."

"Well, I had never needed one," Tommy shrugged, "so I didn't see why you guys did."

The Green Ranger asked Dr. K, "Are we going to be the only team wearing the team uniform?"

But Dr. K just grabbed the cookie jar from him so she could eat some cookies as well.

As Tommy resumed drinking his coffee, he heard a knock at the front door. Bringing along the mug he walked back to the front door, mournfully observing that he hadn't even gotten a chance to sit back down. Opening it, he saw Carter Grayson the Red Lightspeed Ranger on his porch, his five teammates clustered around him. Carter hadn't changed much since Tommy had last seen him- still serious with sandy hair a couple of inches longer than Casey's. He wore a grey T-shirt with the Mariner Bay firefighter logo on it with rust brown pants. Standing to the side Tommy let in the Lightspeed Rescue team.

"Carter."

"Tommy."

"Chad."

The Blue Ranger just nodded.

"Joel."

"What's up?"

"Kelsey- oof!" The Yellow Lightspeed Ranger had hugged him. "It's an honor to meet you!"

"Uh… thanks?" Then the Mitchell siblings entered and Tommy greeted them. "Dana, Ryan. I'm glad you all could come. The others are in the back, raiding my fridge."

"Nice," Joel beamed as he and his teammates headed back.

"Who were in the two Jeeps?" Merrick questioned warily as he pounded back down the stairs. Now he wore blue-grey pants with a beige T-shirt and sneakers. Tommy informed him, "The Lightspeed Rescue team. So, hm, we're still missing a lot of Rangers. Billy, me, and Kat are the only ones of the first ten here, while no one from the second eight is here at all. Lost Galaxy isn't here, but Lightspeed Rescue is. Time Force isn't here, and you're the sole representative of Wild Force. Ninja Storm isn't here, but apparently all of Dino Thunder is here although Kira and Trent need to get their butts in here. SPD and Mystic Force aren't here, but Operation Overdrive, Jungle Fury, and RPM are here."

As he and Merrick walked into the kitchen Tommy asked Dr. K, "Is RPM short for anything or is it like your name?"

Dour she responded, "It's short for Racing Performance Machines."

The Red Ranger looked surprised. "I didn't know that."

"Okay, RJ told me Jungle Fury's names but I don't know you guys."

"I'm Scott, that's Flynn, she's Summer, her boyfriend is Dillon, and the twins are Gem and Gemma."

"Ahem."

"Oh, he's Ranger Green," Dr. K shrugged casually just before biting into a cookie. With a muffled wail he slipped off the counter. "No…"

Scott winced. "Oh boy. This _again_?"

Patting him on the head Dr. K elaborated, "Actually he's Ziggy."

"Ah," a slightly befuddled Tommy replied.

Ziggy glowered up at her. "Don't scare me like that ever again!"

"Like what?" she smiled sweetly at him. Ziggy just blew a raspberry at her. Joel observed with a chuckle, "It's me and Angela all over again."

"You poor people," Kelsey sympathized with the rest of RPM.

Just then Nick-cum-Bowen stepped through the back door. "Hey, Tommy."

Conner, Mack, Casey, and Scott all looked askance at him.

"What? He's the ex-boyfriend of my older adoptive sister. So don't look at me like that."

"Sure, come on in and raid the fridge," Tommy welcomed Mystic Force into his house- all eight of them, including their three mentors who were also Power Rangers. He told RPM, "They're from a more nearby dimension, so technically their mentors do have seniority even over the first five."

"Which means they have seniority over you," Kira noted as she strolled into the kitchen from the front, Trent right behind her. She hugged Dr. O. from behind. "How are you?"

"The morning has been interesting. Yours?"

Kira smiled happily at Trent, who smiled back at her. "Mine has been great, thanks for asking."

Conner and Ethan made gagging noises. Trent noted, "You two have steady girlfriends too, you know."

The pair just looked amused while Kira went over to greet the brown-haired Aussie Xander, who swiftly introduced her to the rest of his teammates.

Meanwhile Merrick had splashed water onto his face from the sink and was about to-

"AAH!" went the nearby Rangers as water droplets sprayed all over them. Tommy grumbled, "Merrick, I thought I had finally gotten it through your head- not cool."

"I thought only RJ did that," Casey observed, making said Ranger blush behind his stubble. Summer looked over at Dillon. "Same here with my boyfriend. Guess we were wrong."

Merrick grumbled and headed towards the front door. Muttering about touchy wolf egos Tommy headed after him.

"Merrick, hello? 'Chill, dude' as Conner would say."

From the coat closet Merrick got out his brown hoodie and pulled it on, zipping it up to his neck. He told Tommy, "I'll go out and make sure no minions attack. Of late my powers have been returning… probably has to do with Billy restoring the animal gems' powers. The wind will warn me when it's time for me to come back. I need some space."

Tommy exhaled. "Fine, but make sure you grab some food from Hayley at the Cyberspace, okay?"

Merrick almost smiled. "Fine."

As Merrick pulled out on his motorcycle, his head hidden beneath his black helmet a large pale blue van pulled into the driveway. From the driver's seat came Tori, who waved at Tommy in the doorway.

"Hey, Dr. O.!"

"Hey, Rangers," Tommy greeted them as the six members of Ninja Storm approached. "Everyone else is raiding my fridge, you guys are free to join in."

"DUDE!" Dustin beamed. "Let's go!"

Tommy let the six younger people run in, but he spotted a green motorcycle pull in. Suspecting who was riding it Tommy stepped out onto the porch. The rider pulled off his helmet, revealing himself as Adam. The three-time Ranger wore his favorite black leather sports jacket, a green polo shirt, and black jeans. The two did a fist bump.

"Most of the junior Rangers are here… but we're missing most of the first eighteen and a lot of the middle Rangers."

Adam shook his head, amused. "Tommy, it's not quite seven. The meeting isn't supposed to start until ten. That's three hours for everyone to show up."

Tommy had the decency to look sheepish. "Well… it's true that even before you came we were already over halfway to having all the Rangers present. I think they're spreading out into the living room and the library now because they all can't fit in the kitchen."

Adam eyed the mug of now-cold coffee in Tommy's hand.

"Do you think they drank up all the coffee or is there still enough for me to have a cup?"

"Even if there isn't I'll make more," Tommy assured him.


	10. Chapter 10: Rally to Reefside II

Disclaimer: I do NOT own the Power Rangers, and I want to restate that any and all present & future connections I make in my other fanfics do NOT apply to this one. Well, save for "A Tardy Present" as usual. And I kept Billy & RJ as cousins. But yeah, other than those two I don't think anything from my other fanfics applies to this one. Just keep that in mind, please.

Oh, and on the matter of Trini; killing her off hadn't crossed my mind, but even if it had I wouldn't have done it because that would mean I'd also have to kill off Udonna. Like I could do THAT to Bowen & Leanbow. Plus I like Trini.

* * *

**Chapter Ten: Rally to Reefside, Part Two**

An hour had passed without any new Rangers showing up. The younger Rangers were all crowded into the living room or the library, swapping stories. Billy, Tommy, Adam, and Kat were sitting at the kitchen table, each drinking their second cup of coffee. There were only crumbs on the plate where there had previously been chocolate chip muffins Tommy had bought at the Cyberspace yesterday.

"I hope that the others show up soon," Billy frowned, stirring his half-drunken coffee absently with a spoon. Adam restated yet again, "We still have two hours before the meeting is supposed to begin."

Kat looked towards the door leading to the rest of the house. "Yeah, but I think the younger Rangers are getting restless."

"True…if they get any more bored they might start up some Ranger-style mischief."

Just then Jason entered through the back door, once again dressed in a red short-sleeved shirt and jeans. Tommy told him, "Hey, Jas. Coffee is on the counter."

"Thanks, Tommy, but I had some before I left. Billy, Adam, Kat. Anyone else here?"

"Not from the first eighteen, no," Billy replied. "But hopefully you'll restart the deluge of arrivals…"

"And the second Great Fridge Raid shall begin," Tommy noted wryly, making Kat laugh. Jason defended himself, explaining, "I had to send the kids off to school before I could come… heck, I teleported here instead of by car because I didn't want to chance any delays on the highway."

"A good point," Adam conceded. "Well, I'm glad you got here early. We've been mostly reminiscing… although there was an interesting fifteen minutes where Billy and Dr. K duked it out to see who would be the alpha techie."

"I won."

"Should I feel bad for this Dr. K? What does the K stand for?"

"Apparently nothing," Tommy shrugged. "At least, that's what she said when I asked her. But what's really scary is that I think she's the Zordon of her home dimension."

Jason thought this over. "Well, okay. So who are we missing?"

Tommy ticked off the missing Rangers of the first twelve. "Zack, Trini, Kimberly, Rocky, Aisha, Tanya, and Justin."

"Then we're missing the teams of in Space, Lost Galaxy, Time Force, Wild Force, and SPD," Billy replied. Kat refuted, "Actually Merrick of Wild Force was here for a bit but he's gone right now."

"Ah."

"Dr. O., someone's at the door! Want me to get it?" yelled Conner from the living room. Tommy yelled back, "I'll get it, I'll get it. Jason, pull up a chair while I go see who's here now."

Jason nodded as Tommy headed off towards the front door once again. Opening it, he found the teams of in Space and Lost Galaxy on his porch. Which wasn't overly surprising, considering that they shared a Ranger- Karone, the second Pink Galaxy Ranger, was also the Red Space Ranger's sister and the former villain Astronema. Tommy greeted them all.

"Hey, thanks for coming. Come on in. Feel free to raid the kitchen prior to joining the others in the living room and the library," Tommy told them as they entered. Looking over his shoulder he noted, "Although some Rangers have now claimed the stairs."

Ziggy did a thumbs up. He, Xander, Cam, and Joel were all sprawled out on the stairs. Shaking his head in amusement Tommy led the two teams to the kitchen so they could have second breakfast. He had just sat back down again, in Space and Lost Galaxy having gone off to join the other younger Rangers, when Ethan called, "Another car in the driveway, Dr. O.! Wow, your driveway is getting full."

Kat squeezed his shoulder. "I'll get it this time."

"I love you," Tommy smiled blissfully up at her as she stood.

She kissed his temple. "I know, and I love you too."

Opening the front door, Kat found on the porch a female Ranger she had rarely gotten the chance to interact with much: Trini Kwan, the first Yellow Power Ranger. The woman had long silky black hair, and wore a yellow sundress with straw sandals. She smiled at the other woman.

"Hello, Kat."

"Hi, Trini. Come on in; the most senior Rangers have retreated to the kitchen."

As she led Trini back to the kitchen Kat noted with some amusement that all the Yellows present- Ashley, Maya, Kelsey, Dustin, Kira, Chip, Ronny, Lily, and Summer- had come to the doorways of the rooms they were in to see the first Yellow Ranger. In the male Yellows' cases that meant the small hallway bathroom. Kat decided it was best not to wonder what the pair was up to, especially as they had toilet plungers on the tops of their heads.

Kat pulled out her own chair for Trini. Puzzled, Jason asked, "Where will you sit?"

"Here," Kat grinned, plopping down onto the lap of her surprised boyfriend. Tommy looked pleased with himself. A few relatively quiet minutes passed but then a knock came at the back door. Tommy called out, "Come in!"

Bridge entered the kitchen, followed by the other eight Space Patrol Delta Power Rangers. For the thirteenth or so time that morning Tommy was grateful he had a fairly large house. Seeing the original SPD Green Ranger eye the toaster Adam laughed, "Go ahead, Bridge. Everyone else has raided the fridge today."

"Woo-hoo!"

Curious Trini asked, "So, you're the SPD team. I'm Trini Kwan, the first Yellow Power Ranger. If you don't mind, could you all introduce yourselves?"

"Sure, I'm Jack."

"Sky," a curt man with clipped dirty blonde hair told her. Jack wore a black T-shirt and red sweatshirts while Sky wore a pale blue long-sleeved shirt and navy blue pants.

"Bridge," Bridge beamed, making his toast. Today he wore a tie-dyed shirt in green, blue, and red with green pants. Adam chuckled.

Almost warily a young woman with dark brown hair in a yellow tank top and black capris said, "Z."

"Syd," smiled a bubbly woman with curly platinum blonde hair. She wore a pink knee-length dress with puffed short sleeves and pink pumps.

"Anubis Cruger," barked out a navy-scaled dog-like alien with an imposing air. He wore a steel grey knee-length tunic and pants. From over by the toaster Bridge noted, "But we all call him Doggie."

"I am a rather impressed Sam," noted a young man with strawberry blond hair. He wore a white golf shirt with jeans. Sam thanked Billy, "Impressive bit of time travel technology you lent us. Thanks… I wasn't looking forward to being a ball of light again."

"No trouble; Trip and Circuit of Time Force assisted me on the endeavor," Billy shrugged off the praise.

"I'm Kat Manx," spoke up the next-to-last Ranger. She had curly black-brown hair and emerald eyes, and almost looked human but for her large cat-like ears and the blue leathery spots on her cheeks and forearms. She wore an orange T-shirt and brown slacks. Trini smiled, "Ah, Billy speaks highly of you."

"She's rather brilliant when it comes to the morphing grid; in some areas she might be better than me."

Jason sputtered out his latest mouthful of coffee. "Wow, and we all know how hard it is for a Wolf to admit there are others who might be better than him at certain things. So you must be good."

"Silence yourself, Jason," Billy grumbled, looking cross. Jason just smirked.

"And I'm Nova," spoke up a young woman with black hair and fair skin, dressed in a grey T-shirt and pants. "It's an honor to meet you all."

"Once you're done raiding the fridge almost everyone else is scattered around Tommy's house," Adam informed them. "That includes some friends of ours, Bridge."

"Nice," beamed Bridge, who was working on toasting his third batch of toast. "This is going to be so much fun!"

His teammates didn't look so sure. Stepping forward Z asked, "So… is it really okay if we raid your fridge, Dr. Oliver?"

"Call me Dr. O., and yeah. Everyone else has today."

"Awesome," Jack grinned, heading towards the fridge. Z, Syd, Sam, and Nova followed suit. Bridge had already gotten started on his beloved 'buttery' toast. After exchanging looks, the remaining three SPD Rangers did a bit of fridge-raiding of their own.

"It's almost eight-thirty," observed Kat once the SPD Rangers had dispersed. "Hm, we're about due for another arrival…"

Kira yelled out, "DR. O.! It's Tanya Sloan! You know, the famous singer and not to mention Adam's girlfriend!"

Bug-eyed, Adam fell out of his chair. Jason just did a face-palm. Not quite sure what was going on, Trini stood up. She commented, "I'll go get her. You guys chill."

Trini hugged Tanya once both women were in the front hallway.

"It's great to see you again, Tanya… but why did Tommy's student refer to you as Adam's girlfriend? Last time I checked you two weren't dating…"

"We aren't!" Tanya blushed against her chocolate-colored skin. Kira yelled out, "You two are more obvious and oblivious than me and Trent back when we were in denial!"

"_Someone_ takes after Aisha," muttered Trini. Tanya couldn't help but grin, "Actually, she was the only girl on her team so I think she had to become outspoken to survive."

"Ah… true. Plus I believe she's a Pterodactyl which means there's some Kim in there too."

"Mm."

In the kitchen Trini noticed that a certain someone had left. Tommy smiled lopsidedly, "He decided to go make sure the auditorium is all set for whatever presentation we are doing."

"Whatever presentation Justin and I are doing," Billy corrected Tommy. Trini retook her seat and Tanya opted to lean against the wall rather than sit in Adam's vacated seat. Curiously Jason asked, "What will you do, Billy? I know little Justin is going to recap everyone's previous adventures… but…"

Billy gave Jason a long look. "What you cognate I will be doing?"

"Oh… handing out recharged morphers?"

"And uniforms," Billy confirmed. "Although RPM is already properly attired, and Dr. K did manage to repower and purify her team's morphers."

"Purify?" Tanya echoed. She joked, "What, was she worried that her team's morphers would infect our morphing grid with an aspect found only in their dimension?"

"Not exactly… apparently Venjix- their arch villain- managed to slip in a part of him into the Red Ranger's morpher, which is how he survived. As he had done it to the Red morpher, all the other morphers had also been compromised. Presumably Venjix has now allied himself with Ivan Ooze."

"But how…?" Tommy frowned. Billy sipped his coffee. "Yes, Tommy?"

"I'm far from an expert on morphers, but surely it couldn't have been that easy to sabotage a morpher. Rita had the Green Power Coin for centuries, the Titanium morpher was never so much corrupted as misused- same as the Thunder morphers, and the White Dino Gem had been corrupted by Mesogog for a few years. And it sounded like Venjix managed to insert this portion of him into the Red morpher without any notable side effects."

"The perceived reason was causing physical harm to the Red Ranger, but the real reason was to have a back-up version of himself on hand."

"You make him sound like a computer virus, Billy," Trini grinned.

"He is. And therefore he was able to conquer 99.9 percent of the world. RJ let it slip that the twins let it slip that the only way they defeated him was by dropping a building on him."

"And he's still not all the way gone," Kat shivered, subconsciously cuddling closer to Tommy. Everyone jumped slightly when there was a knock at the back door. Tommy said, "Come in!"

Zack, dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans, entered, followed by Rocky and Aisha. The latter wore a yellow golf shirt and off-white capris while the former wore a red & blue striped shirt and brown slacks.

Rocky explained, "We had to drop off the kids before we could drive up."

"There's some lukewarm coffee left, feel free to raid the fridge, and I still have to get a straight answer out of Billy."

"Now what?"

"I'm still confused," Tommy pressed. "Even taking into account the fact that Venjix was a computer virus, there's no way he could have survived more or less undetected in a morpher unless it was a system he was familiar with."

Trini tapped her fingers against the table. "I don't like what you're implying here, Tommy."

Billy stared into his coffee. "RJ also told me he had learned the twins and K had been raised in a 'military think tank'."

"I could hear the quotation marks," Jason noted. Billy half-smirked. "Oh, come on, Jason. You can't think it's a coincidence that the computer virus that almost managed to take over the Earth of a far-away dimension has the exact same name as one of the Machine Empire generals who tried to revive Lord Zedd's Zord in 2002?"

"Putties, I hadn't thought of that," Tommy admitted. Rocky grumbled, "I still wish I had gotten to go to the moon in 2002. But no, Jason got to go instead."

"He had had the Red Power Coin first," Aisha replied tiredly. Everyone present had heard this rant before countless times. Thankfully Rocky just muttered under his breath and delved deeper into Tommy's fridge. Kat observed, "Someone needs to ask Dr. K about this."

"I dunno… she's kind of scary," Tommy noted. "Plus she is more or less the Zordon of her dimension. Hm."

"But someone has to do it," Aisha countered prior to biting into the turkey sandwich she had made since her arrival.

"I'll do it," Kim chirruped as she entered the kitchen. She wore a pink halter top and jean shorts. Zack grinned, "You don't even know what we're talking about, Kimberly."

"Whatever. I'll still do it. Oo, are we raiding Tommy's fridge?"

"Affirmative."

"Yay… move over, Rocky."

Jason questioned, "Who are we still missing?"

"Justin is down in the Dino Lair," Adam revealed as he exited the stairwell leading down to said location. "He got in via the entrance in the Cyberspace."

"Hi, Adam."

"Hi, Tanya."

Zack did a face-palm. "Did I seriously pick you to be the second Black Power Ranger?"

"It's not like candidates were everywhere, Zack," Billy chuckled. "And under the circumstances not only Adam, but Rocky and Aisha as well, did quite well."

Jason, Zack, and Trini exchanged uneasy looks. They still had doubts on whether or not they should have left Angel Grove when they did, despite the success of their successors. Jason especially, as he had left Angel Grove again –the second time with Emily- shortly after graduation when Turbo was just starting out. From within the fridge Kimberly's voice rang out.

"Jackpot! Chinese takeout! Impressive that it's still here… yum, sesame chicken with chow mein!"

"HEY! That has a sticky note saying 'for Tommy alone' on it!" Tommy yelped, swiveling his head around. Prudently Kat got off his lap so he could head off Kim. He snagged the box from her. Then he had to hold it above his head when Kimberly continued her efforts to obtain the Chinese food. As she jumped up and down, trying to reach it, he pressed down on her head with his other hand. Her eyes narrowed stubbornly.

Exhaling deeply Billy got up and yanked the box from Tommy's hand. "Here you go, Kim!"

"Thank you, Billy," she beamed before plopping down happily on the counter, digging out the pair of still-wrapped chopsticks to eat her spoils with. Tommy looked cross as he retook his seat. While Kat and Billy did the same, the latter defended himself.

"She was thirty seconds away from attacking you for the Chinese food, Tommy. It wasn't worth it."

"Somehow I doubt that," Tommy grumbled darkly, but he perked when Kat gave him a kiss on the cheek.

Sitting cross-legged on the floor, Rocky and Aisha were enjoying their own spoils from Tommy's sticky note covered fridge. The latter wondered, "So who's still not here?"

"Most of us are here by now," Adam admitted as he poured himself a third cup of coffee. It helped that the coffee pot was on the opposite side of the kitchen as Tanya. "All of the first eighteen are here now, right?"

"Right," Kat nodded. "I think we're only missing Time Force and Wild Force now."

"Maybe we should start migrating the Rangers down to the auditorium in the Dino Lair then," Billy suggested. Jason nodded. "Good idea."

"I'll do it," Tommy sighed. He nuzzled at his girlfriend's neck. "Scoot."

With a giggle Kat complied. Standing at the kitchen doorway Tommy let out a loud whistle. It didn't get much quieter due to all the noise the fifty odd Rangers were making, but luckily Ethan spotted Dr. O. and got Kira's attention.

After the ear-piercing sonic scream Kira had done there was utter silence which Tommy gratefully took advantage of.

"All right, starting with RPM we'll be heading down into the Dino Lair because hopefully the remaining two teams will be arriving soon. Actually, Conner and Ethan, could you two serve as guides and make sure everyone gets to the auditorium all right?"

The two young men nodded.

"Thanks. Let's go."

It took roughly a half an hour to get almost everyone downstairs. Even Rocky, Aisha, Adam, Kat, and Tanya headed down to keep the younger Rangers in check. Trini smiled wistfully.

"It's been a long time since it's been just the six of us. Longer since we've had a chance to hang out without Tommy."

"This is my house," the five-time Ranger muttered rebelliously.

Zack exhaled. "Hard to believe we'll all be back in action."

Billy nodded. "Affirmative."

Jason asked, "All right, we know we five will be using our original morphers, especially as I can't access the Gold powers anymore."

Billy admitted, "I haven't managed that or repowering the Green Power Coin. Those two are the only two morphers missing so to speak."

Tommy commented, "Cassie and Kat have agreed that Cassie will use the Pink Space morpher alone and Kat the Pink Turbo morpher alone so that Karone can use the Pink Zeonizer."

"Zeo and Turbo will have to be the odds and ends teams," Billy admitted. Resolutely Zack stated, "Adam has gotten to use the Black Power Coin twice outside of Mighty Morphin. He can stick to Green this time around."

"Jason isn't quite willing to relinquish the Red Power Coin but if Rocky occasionally wants to use the Red Zeonizer instead of the Blue I won't argue," Tommy said simply. "Besides, I bet TJ will lend me the Red Turbo morpher happily."

"Aisha is more than happy to use the Yellow Zeonizer; she said something about getting to use it this time around," Trini noted. Kim slurped up some chow mein.

"This is really good, Tommy. Where did you get this from?"

"Salt in the wound, Kim, salt in the wound."

Kim just rolled her eyes. "You're overreacting."

The other three just laughed.

At that moment Merrick dashed through the back door, his brown hoodie still zipped up. Running a hand through his floppy brown hair, he told them, "Time Force and Wild Force are here."

He paused. "Something's different yet not different."

"It's not noisy anymore," Tommy revealed. "Go down to the auditorium in the Dino Lair; this mega meeting is about to begin."

As Kira and Trent entered the kitchen the latter informed their mentor, "Dr. O., your driveway just got even fuller."

"I know, Trent. You two and Merrick need to head down into the Dino Lair."

"Okay," Kira agreed.


	11. Chapter 11: Mega Meeting

Disclaimer: Sigh. Saban owns the Power Rangers, not I.

But hey, give Power Rangers some major respect. Any show that can survive being cancelled as many times as Tommy Oliver has had morphers deserves it.

This is more or less a rehash for anyone who has only seen certain seasons. Please endure it because with any luck this is the last of the start-up chapters.

PS: if you review, please wish me a happy birthday- please?

* * *

**Chapter Eleven: Mega Meeting**

The first six had led Time Force and Wild Force, the last two teams to arrive, down to the medium-sized auditorium in the Dino Lair. Most of the cushioned seats were already filled, as the room could only seat a hundred. But there was a cluster of seats in the back the pair of teams took. Merrick, who was sitting towards the front, exhaled in relief.

Jason, his arms akimbo, stood before everyone while the other five original Rangers made themselves comfortable on the edge of the stage at the front of the room.

"Hello, I am Jason Lee Scott for those of you who don't know me. I am the original Red Power Ranger and the Gold Zeo Ranger. Behind me are the other five Rangers who had morphers the school year of 1993 to 1994, our freshman year of high school."

"Billy Cranston, the first and only Blue Power Ranger."

"You're never going to let the rest of us live that down, are you?" Jason sighed. Billy smiled, "Negative."

"Anyway, I'm Zack Taylor, the first Black Power Ranger."

"I'm Trini Kwan, the first Yellow Power Ranger."

"The first Pink Power Ranger is me, Kimberly Hart."

Tommy counted his morphers, ticking off a finger with each one. "I'm Tommy Oliver: the Green Power Ranger, the White Power Ranger, the Red Zeo Ranger, the first Red Turbo Ranger, and the Black Dino Ranger. Yeah, that's all of them."

"So far," Zack intoned.

"Shut up."

"You know I'm right."

"I _said_ shut up."

"Boys," Trini sighed. Sheepishly they chorused, "Sorry."

Shaking his head out of bemusement Jason stated, "I think Justin has a presentation to introduce everyone more or less to one another?"

"Yep," Justin nodded, getting up from his front row seat. Today he wore a jean jacket, a blue-grey T-shirt, and jeans. "I have it on a DVD."

Tommy pressed a button on his remote control, lowering a projection screen. Billy noted, "I might be the genius of the team, but you Tommy are the crazy prepared mad scientist."

"That's how I got a fifth morpher," he shrugged modestly as Justin set up to show his presentation.

"I suppose we all know how the Power Ranger legacy began…" Justin noted the awkward looks on most of the Rangers' faces. "Whew. Good thing I included our origins then, eh?"

An image of the Gym and Juice Bar came up, 'Autumn 1993' written in brown letters across the bottom.

"This is where it all began. The Gym and Juice Bar, then owned by a guy named Ernie, in the city of Angel Grove. A group of five high school freshmen who were all friends were spending time at this location when an earthquake occurred. We all live in California, so this wasn't too much of a surprise, especially as it was a fairly mild earthquake. But what happened next was."

The image changed to one of the Command Center, taken by Trini at some point during their freshman year.

"The five friends found themselves transported to a strange place where they encountered a fully automated droid named Alpha 5 and a mysterious floating, giant head who introduced himself as Zordon. This Zordon explained that an evil sorceress named Rita Repulsa, along with her minions, had escaped and now sought to conquer Earth. And he had chosen them as Earth's heroes- to become Power Rangers."

A huge cheer occurred. Most of them hadn't heard the origin story before, so it was understandable. Justin let the noise die down before changing the image to that of a fourteen-year-old Jason and resuming the narration.

"Jason was given the Red Power Coin, becoming the Red Power Ranger, the leader of the group."

Then the image was that of Zack as a fourteen-year-old.

"Zack was given the Black Power Coin, becoming the Black Power Ranger. He would more or less serve as the cornerstone of the team."

Next came an image of Trini as a high school freshman.

"Trini, the heart of the group, was given the Yellow Power Coin. She became the Yellow Power Ranger."

After that came an image of a fourteen-year-old Kimberly.

"Kimberly received the Pink Power Coin. The spunky and admittedly girly one of the team, she became the Pink Power Ranger."

Then came an image of a young, very geeky Billy.

"Last but not least was Billy, the brains of the team. As the holder of the Blue Power Coin, he became the Blue Power Ranger."

As the image shifted to that of the fivesome together as freshmen Justin continued, "But, of course, these guys had never heard of Power Rangers before. So they left, although Jason and Trini almost immediately had doubts about leaving. Zack argued against the weirdness, but before the remaining two could voice their opinions Putties –the minions of Rita Repulsa- attacked them. After being soundly defeated by them, the group used their morphers for the first time. Next they returned to Angel Grove where Goldar and more putties were attacking."

The image changed to a somewhat grainy newspaper image of the five morphed Rangers fighting Putties.

"Zordon and Alpha 5 gave them their Dinozords when Goldar supersized. Together they defeated Goldar but didn't destroy him. And thus the Power Ranger legacy began."

The image changed again, this time to an image of the moon.

"Rita sent down more monsters from her moon fortress as time went on. Billy made the communicators towards the beginning of their adventures, which accidentally proved to double as teleporters to and from the Command Center where Alpha 5 and Zordon dwelled. Zordon also told them about the Power Weapons, which proved useful as time went on. But it was still fall when the Rangers faced their greatest threat yet."

The image changed to that of Tommy Oliver as a freshman.

"After tying with Jason in a karate tournament Rita Repulsa chose new student Tommy Oliver as the evil Green Power Ranger. Mostly due to luck the other Rangers broke the spell on him and he joined their team, raising their number to six."

"Now I'm going to be fast-forwarding through the second year of Mighty Morphin all the way through RPM because otherwise we'll be here all day- literally. It turns out Billy has somehow made a collection of comic books based off of all the Power Rangers adventures save for RPM's. Go talk to him if you want more details."

So Justin, in rapid succession, showed Lord Zedd's arrival, Tommy's draining of Green powers and his receival of White powers, the power transfer (carefree Rocky, tough Aisha, and shy Adam), the union of Lord Zedd and Rita Repulsa, the addition of sweet Aussie Kat, and the destruction of the Power Coins.

Then came Zeo: Kat, Tanya (an upbeat musician), Rocky, Adam, and Tommy, with Billy as tech support and the Machine Empire as their foes. The addition of Jason as the Gold Zeo Ranger, the departure of Billy to Aquitar, the loss of Jason's Gold powers, and the stopping of the Machine Empire were all recapped.

But then came Divatox, and so the Turbo powers were given to Tommy, Adam, Kat, Tanya, and a preteen yet brilliant Justin. But soon the elder four passed on their powers to TJ, an earnest baseball player; Carlos, a cocky soccer star; Cassie, a rebellious musician; and Ashley, an upbeat cheerleader. The Phantom Ranger came and helped out for a bit. A few more of their adventures were shown but then came the fall of the Command Center.

Sans Justin, the Rangers and Alpha 6 went into space. They joined Andros the Red Space Ranger, who gave them the other Space morphers. Their main foes were Astronema and Dark Spector, who had taken Zordon captive. Zhane was revived and resumed his post as the Silver Space Ranger. Astronema proved to be Andros' lost sister Karone but was re-enchanted into Astronema by Dark Spector, and the Psycho Rangers proved to be a serious threat before finally being defeated. In the end, Zordon sacrificed himself to save not just Angel Grove but the universe and redeem the villains who could be redeemed- Rita, Zedd, Divatox, and Karone.

On the spaceship Terra Venture a new team of Power Rangers came into play: Leo, a young wanna-be adventurer; Maya, an empathic alien; Kai, an upright military person; Damon, an easy-going mechanic; and Kendrix, an intelligent but sweet researcher. They were needed to fight Trakeena and her allies from taking Terra Venture or the Quasar Sabers for themselves. Later, freed from the spirit of the original Magna Defender Leo's older and more serious brother Mike joined the team. However when the Psycho Rangers were revived, even the combined might of in Space and Lost Galaxy was not enough. Kendrix had to sacrifice herself, Karone taking her place. In the end, Terra Venture found and escaped from the lost galaxy, landing on Mirinoi. Upon replacing the Quasar Sabers, the Mirinoians were restored to normal as was Kendrix.

Near the city of Mariner Bay a portal to the demon world had been opened and they wanted to destroy Mariner Bay. Captain Mitchell and Ms. Fairweather in the Aquabase collected a team of five to battle the demons: Carter, a firefighter; Chad, an aquatic mammal trainer; Joel, a stuntman; Kelsey, an extreme sports athlete; and Dana, a nurse as well as the Captain's daughter. They fought the demons as the Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue. A short time later under the demons' dark influence a human stole the new Titanium morpher and used it to defeat the Rangers. But the Captain revealed that this human was in fact his lost son Ryan, Dana's older brother. So once redeemed, Ryan joined the team although he later left to find a way to seal away the demons for good. After many struggles the team came together to defeat the demons once and for all.

Far into the future even now, a Red Ranger named Alex took down the evil mastermind Ransik, a mutant. But on the way to prison his daughter Nadira helped him escape to the chagrin of Alex's teammates- Lucas, a former race car driver; Trip, a psychic and innocent alien; Katie, a super-strong and loyal friend; and Jen, a tough fighter. The pair, along with their robot Frax, used a time ship to go back to 2001 after Ransik seemingly killed Alex. Jen, enraged at her new fiancée's death, took the morphers and her teammates in the other time ship to follow Ransik. But they had to add in Alex's far less serious doppelganger- Wes- for the Time Force morphers to work despite Jen's repeated reluctance. But just as the team got to work together as a cohesive team Wes' old school friend Eric obtained the Quantum morpher and refused to work as a teammate. But the others eventually wore him down into joining the team while Frax revealed his own treachery against Ransik. Despite heavy defeats, and a marked change in the returned Alex's personality, in the end a redeemed Nadira talked her father into giving himself in. Sadly Wes and Eric were left behind while their equally miserable teammates returned to the future.

An Air Force pilot named Taylor had found the reality of her favorite childhood story- Animaria, the flying island full of living animal Zords. It was ruled over by the Princess Shayla. Taylor was joined by sweet college student Alyssa, brash teenager Max, and shy plant specialist Danny. Later the empathic and curious Cole arrived and became the team leader, usurping Taylor to her initial displeasure. The five protected Animaria as the Wild Force Rangers against the evil Orgs. In time they began to find and free more Wild Zords, but not everyone being freed was friendly… such as the dark wolf Duke Org Zen-Aku. Then the surprised Rangers learned that Zen-Aku was in fact one of the original Ancient Warriors, Merrick the Silver Wolf. Even after being freed of the dark spell on him, Merrick proved to be uneasy to join his teammates mostly due to his crush on the princess (an audible squeak was heard at this time but the Lunar Wolf Warrior otherwise remained silent). The Master Org proved to have a vendetta against Cole having been a former friend and the killer of Cole's parents, and when revived became a full Org. But in the end all Orgs were either defeated or redeemed. So the princess and her Zords retreated back to the Animarium, leaving behind the six Rangers.

When the dark ninja Lothor destroyed the Wind Ninja Academy outside of the city Blue Bay Harbor, only three students remained free due to being late again- tough skateboarder Shane, tomboy surfer Tori, and geeky motocross mechanic Dustin. Their sensei had been turned into a guinea pig by Lothor while the sensei's son Cam became the tech support of Power Rangers Ninja Storm who began the battle against Lothor as well as his nieces Kapri and Marah. But Lothor tricked the Bradley brothers into believing that the Rangers' sensei had killed their adoptive parents so they fought the Rangers- older, sterner Hunter as the Crimson Ranger and the younger, more relaxed Blake as the Navy Ranger. In the end it turned out that Lothor had killed the Bradleys so after some inner turmoil the pair joined the team. Shortly afterwards, tired of being discounted due to not being a Ranger, the smart and sharp-tongued Cam accidentally went into past and learned some dark secrets about his family past- namely that Lothor and his father were twins! But he also became the Green Samurai Ranger, helping the other Rangers in their fight against Lothor. In the end, though, Lothor's real plan was revealed in that he had plotted to fill the Abyss of Evil with felled monsters in order to unleash its full power. So the Rangers drained their powers in order to defeat Lothor once and for all, with Marah and Kapri being redeemed.

On their first day as seniors at Reefside High School carefree soccer star Conner, loner musician Kira, and wise-cracking computer gamer Ethan all managed to get detention from Principal Randall. She gave detention duty to the rookie science teacher: Dr. Thomas Oliver (here Justin paused to wet his throat and let the cheering die down). Dr. O. just sent them off to find some dinosaur-related items and the trio found exactly what he was looking for- the three Dino Gems to use against the mutant dinosaur scientist Mesogog with his allies Elsa and Zeltrax. He soon joined the Dino Thunder Rangers himself as the Black Dino Ranger, but shortly afterwards the new evil White Dino Ranger entrapped him in amber. Then Kira's crush, the shy and artistic Trent, admitted that he was slowly going under the influence of the evil White Dino Gem. Yet things turned out better than expected; Trent and the White Dino Gem became good, joining the team, while after a series of mishaps Dr. O. was restored to normal. However Mesogog still had some cards up his sleeve- most notably that Elsa's alter ego was Principal Randall while his own alter ego was Trent's adoptive father… and that Trent had known for a while but had kept it a secret. Yet their good alter egos were redeemed and their bad ones defeated in time for the Prom.

In 2025 a dimension over the intergalactic Power Rangers agency of Space Patrol Delta was facing a major threat of their own- the Troobian Empire, headed by Emperor Gruumm with the dual-sided Mora-cum-Morgana at his side. After the A-squad was captured the B-squad was put into action: Jack, a tough loner; Sky, a strict by-the-books overachiever; Bridge, an eccentric, innocent mechanic; Z, a wry and cautious tomboy; and Syd, a complete girly-girl. They were later joined by their aloof commander, Doggie Cruger, and a quiet friend from the future named Sam. While the Rangers grew closer to finding out how to stop Gruumm once and for all their tech support Kat Manx became a Ranger for an hour to stop a monster only she could stop. Finally, Emperor Gruumm's main ship arrived at Earth and the final showdown occurred. The B-squad had to first face off their gone-to-the-dark-side-counterparts in the A-squad while Doggie stopped Gruumm. For his part, Sam got some last-minute aid from his friend Nova, who was also from the future. In the end Gruumm and Mora were captured and stopped.

Outside of the city Briarwood is a vast, mysterious forest. In 2006 five young people volunteered to help an old man who proved to be the White Mystic Ranger under an illusion. By volunteering to help, they had actually volunteered to become the new Mystic Force Power Rangers. But Udonna, the White Ranger, had her morpher stolen by the Dark Wolf Koragg who was the right-hand warrior of the Master of the Underworld. Thus Nick, a newcomer and a wary loner; Vida, a defiant DJ; Chip, a loyal geek; Madison, the shy but willful twin of Vida; and Xander, a confident and grounded Aussie, were on their own in battling the forces of the Underworld, such as the general of the undead Morticon and the vampire queen Necrolai. The former was defeated by the Rangers during the time when Udonna's accident-prone apprentice Clare actually turned out to be the new Gatekeeper and her mother, the previous Gatekeeper, had been Udonna's sister who had died in the Great Battle 20 years ago that had sealed away the Underworld until recently. Next the Solaris Knight Daggeron and the evil wizard Imperious were both freed of the curses each had imposed on one another during the battle fought over when Daggeron was taking Udonna's son to safety. Chip accidentally let it slip to everyone else that Daggeron had told him about Udonna's husband Leanbow, the previous Red Mystic. Soon it was revealed that Leanbow had not died sealed within the Underworld as Udonna had thought- he had been cursed into Koragg. Although freed Leanbow had to leave to stop the Master while Imperious' defeat at Daggeron's sword had unleashed the Ten Terrors. But at last reunited the eight Mystic Force Rangers defeated the Underworld once and for all as well as united the magical and mundane worlds within Briarwood.

The next year billionaire archeologist Andrew Hartford rallied up a team of Power Rangers to collect and defend the jewels of the Corona Aurora because he had found the crown part, freeing both its guardian the Sentinel Knight and the evil estranged brothers Moltor and Flurious. Rose, the genius college student; Ronny, the –ah- driven race car driver; Dax, a skilled stuntman; Will, a talented item retriever; and Mack, Andrew's protected son formed the team of Operation Overdrive Power Rangers. More threats came to face the Rangers as other villains learned of the possible completion of the most powerful artifact in the universe. But they also gained an ally in the friendly and heroic alien Tyzonn, who later joined the team as the Mercury Ranger. After many twists and turns the Rangers completed the Corona Aurora and defeated all the evils after it.

After Dai Shi had escaped his confines in the Pai Zhua Academy, killing Master Mao in the process, three of his Pai Zhua students- the cheerful Lily, the focused Theo, and the youthful Casey- journeyed to Ocean Bluff where they found a new teacher in RJ, an oddball pizza place owner who gave them the Solar morphers which turned them into the Jungle Fury Rangers. As time passed the trio learned to use different animal spirits but their fellow employee Fran got more and more irritable about their constant disappearances. Then Dai Shi and his right-hand woman Camille took RJ hostage, so the trio traveled to the Spirit World to take on the next level of power while RJ survived a battle against Dai Shi. Although the trio saved RJ, their victory came at a relatively low cost- Fran learned their secret. But then the cost rose as RJ proved to have been spiritually wounded during his battle with Dai Shi, turning him into a werewolf. After Fran managed to turn him back, RJ joined the team as the first ever Violet Ranger. As threats rose and were dealt with, bookworm traveller Dom became the fifth Ranger as the White Rhino Ranger. In the end Casey broke Dai Shi's host free of Dai Shi, so that Dai Shi and Dai Shi alone was destroyed at the end of the day.

Justin wrapped up with a group photo of RPM, stating, "Since it took place in such a distant dimension, even Billy doesn't know much about RPM. All we know so far is that they had it really rough, battling an evil sentient computer virus who had already taken over ninety-nine percent of the world by the time the morphers were given out. Their mentor was, for almost all of their adventures, a seventeen-year-old genius. The seven Rangers were: Scott, the Red Ranger, a former Air Force pilot; Flynn, the Blue Ranger, a Scottish mechanic; Summer, the Yellow Ranger, a reformed party girl; Ziggy, the Green Ranger; a literal thief with a heart of gold; Dillon, the Black Ranger, a loyal young man who Venjix had turned into an amnesiac cyborg; and then Gem and Gemma, the twin Gold and Silver Rangers, two friends of K's from the military think tank they had been raised in. But like all Power Rangers before them, they defeated Venjix… if not as completely as they would have liked as new data as revealed."

Worn out, Justin turned off the DVD player. Trini commented, "Now that the rehashing is over with, I believe Billy has quite a few morphers and uniforms to hand out."

Billy opened an adjoining door. "All right, let's do this in reverse chronological order. Dr. K already repowered the RPM morphers and handed out her team's uniforms, so Jungle Fury you're up first."

After all the morphers and uniforms had been passed out, the Rangers hung out in various clusters, asking out what had been left out in the recaps. Conner strolled up to Dr. O., clearly amused.

"I noticed there wasn't anything on your relationship with Kim or your relationship with Kat. Or with any other official couple. The closest we got was Kira's crush on Trent, which is interesting in and of itself…"

Tommy shrugged. "Well, it was because of their mutual crushes on one another that Trent had told Kira about him being the evil White Ranger. And you forgot- Merrick's crush on Princess Shayla was referenced, as well as Alex and Jen's failed relationship although it is interesting that Justin didn't go into details about why it failed."

"True. It's good to be back in action."

A faint, repetitive 'ai ai ai' could suddenly be heard coming from the other room. Conner frowned, "Is that one of the Alphas?"

"No; Alpha 6 is at Adam's dojo. That's my rebooted monster detector… it looks like Billy handed out the morphers just in time."


	12. Chapter 12: The Battle of the Six Cities

Major butt-kicking will ensue in this chapter, without me owning the Power Rangers. I am of the opinion however that the plot bunny is mine- all mine! Mostly.

And yes, the morphing calls aren't wholly accurate. :P But they're the ones I'll be using, okay?

* * *

**Chapter Twelve: The Battle of Six Cities**

All was silent in the auditorium now. Tommy had brought back down the projector screen, and on it showed five separate images of various villains and their minions wreaking havoc in six Ranger cities- Angel Grove, Silver Hills, Turtle Cove, Briarwood, San Angeles, and Ocean Bluff. Katherine scratched the back of her head before asking practically, "All right, how are we going to split this up?"

"By color," Zack suggested, aiming a smirk in Tommy's direction. Tommy just smirked back, holding up the wrist that had the Black Dino Holder on it. "I'll just go with my Black morpher."

"I suppose that works; except for Tommy maybe we should all go with our first morpher," Adam commented. Jason nodded. "That sounds good to me."

"EH?"

Trini looked over at Rocky and Aisha, the former having made the exclamation. "Well, except for a few notable examples, we should go with our first morpher."

"I claim Angel Grove for the Pinks," Kimberly jumped in. Billy protested, "No fair! I was a Ranger longer than you and I was the only Blue Power Ranger… why can't I and the other Blues have Angel Grove?"

"Fine," muttered Kimberly crossly, knowing that he had a valid point. "You can have Angel Grove then."

Billy beamed. Darkly Kimberly stated, "Then the Pinks will have Briarwood, no matter what."

"All right," Trini conceded, amused. "Well, while we're on the topic how about I and the other Yellows have Ocean Bluff? Is that all right with everyone?"

It was all right with everyone. Zack suggested next, "Well, maybe Greens and Blacks ought to team up?"

"Cool," agreed Jason. "How about you guys go to San Angeles? Does that sound like a plan?"

"Oh yeah."

"Meanwhile us Reds will go to Silver Hills," Jason continued. Tommy sighed, "Jason, what about the mix-and-match colored Rangers?"

Jason shrugged, eyeing the projector screen. "Looks like Turtle Cove is the only city left undefended. They can go there. All right, I think Billy has modified the morphers so all this travel won't be too hard on us?"

Billy nodded. "Affirmative. I designed a relatively simple program enabling the morphers to teleport you between Ranger headquarters. It'll make going to and from battles much easier, especially as spread out as the battles will most likely be."

"Things are getting rough out there," Trini observed. "We'd better get a move on."

Eagerly the Rangers split up for battle, Billy quickly inserting the program into six of the RPM morphers before they left.

In a plaza in Ocean Bluff stood some old 'friends' of certain Rangers- a grown Prince Sprocket, Trakeena, and Shimazu. They were surrounded by Cogs, Sting Wingers, and Kelzacks all at battle ready. Dustin noted, "Not cool, dude!"

Trini agreed, saying, "All right, let's show these guys why you don't mess with the Power Rangers!"

She held her morpher out in front of her before saying her morphing call: "Saber tooth tiger! Yellow Power Ranger!"

Aisha followed, using the Yellow Zeonizer. "It's morphing time! Zeo Ranger 2 Yellow!"

Tanya called out, "Shift into Turbo! Yellow Turbo Ranger!"

Ashley shouted, "Let's Rocket! Yellow Space Ranger!"

"Go Galactic! Yellow Galaxy Ranger!" called out Maya.

Right after her Kelsey stated, "Lightspeed Rescue! Yellow Lightspeed Ranger!"

Katie said, "Time for Time Force! Yellow Time Force Ranger!"

Taylor called out, "Wild Access! Soaring Eagle!"

"Ninja Storm, Ranger Form!" shouted Dustin as he morphed into- "Yellow Wind Ranger! Power of Earth!"

Kira shouted, "Dino Thunder, Power Up! Yellow Dino Ranger!"

Z stated, "SPD Emergency! SPD Yellow Ranger!"

Chip got out his Mystic Morpher: "Magical Source, Mystic Force! Fast as Lightening! Yellow Mystic Ranger!"

Ronny shouted, "Overdrive Accelerate! Yellow Overdrive Ranger!"

Lily put on her Solar Morpher. "Jungle Beast, Spirit Unleashed! With the speed of a cheetah! Yellow Jungle Fury Ranger!"

Summer used her RPM Morpher. "RPM! Get in Gear!"

Everyone waited, even the minions. Now morphed, Summer looked at the other Yellow Rangers. "What?"

"Nothing…" trailed off Trini. "All right, Yellows, let's go!"

Using their martial arts skills (and the odd magical/enhanced ability) the Yellows battled the enemies. Dustin and Chip tag-teamed against Prince Sprocket while Trini took on a gang of Cogs by herself.

Meanwhile Aisha, Tanya, and Ashley had combined their powers to take on Trakeena. Maya, Taylor, and Summer took on the Sting Wingers, getting out their respective weapons (Delta Daggers, Eagle Sword, and Zip Charger) to do so. The remaining Yellows took on the Kelzacks… except for Ronny who decided to tackle Shimazu by herself. Unfortunately there was a reason there's a Power Ranger team as Trini had to come to her rescue once she was done battling Cogs.

On the verge of defeat Shimazu stepped back. He warned Trini, "We'll be back!"

Then he, Trakeena, and Prince Sprocket portaled away. Their helmets removed Trini looked over at the young Yellow.

"Ronny, try not to rush into things next time, all right?"

Sheepishly she nodded.

…

Meanwhile the Black and Green Rangers had shown up in downtown San Angeles where the three Overlords from Jungle Fury were overseeing the Rin Shi's rampage. Zack smirked.

"All right, let's do this thing! Mastodon! Black Power Ranger!"

"Shift into Turbo! Green Turbo Ranger!" Adam called out, morphing.

"Let's Rocket!" shouted Carlos. Once he morphed he said, "Black Space Ranger!"

Damon did: "Go Galactic! Green Galaxy Ranger!"

At this point Ziggy turned to Dillon, questioning, "Should we say something after we morph?"

"No."

"But everyone else is!"

"Ziggy, we're not everyone else."

Ziggy just crossed his arms and sulked.

"Lightspeed Rescue!" shouted Joel. "Green Lightspeed Ranger!"

"Time for Time Force! Green Time Force Ranger!" called out Trip.

"Wild Access! Iron Bison!" stated Danny firmly.

Cam held out his morpher. "Samurai Storm, Ranger Form! Green Samurai Power!"

"Dino Thunder, Power Up!" shouted Tommy Oliver. "Black Dino Ranger!"

"SPD Emergency! SPD Green Ranger!" called out Bridge.

"Magical Source, Mystic Force!" stated Xander. "Strong as a tree! Green Mystic Ranger!"

"Overdrive Accelerate! Black Overdrive Ranger!" Will shouted.

In tandem Ziggy and Dillon morphed: "Get in Gear!"

Once they realized the junior two Rangers had nothing else to say the Black and Green Rangers got to fighting. It was soon realized that it'd be for the best to keep Trip and Ziggy in the back, leaving Danny and Dillon to keep the pair out of trouble. The two Black Rangers dealt with a decent number of Rin Shi between them; the two Green Rangers not so much.

Zack, Adam, and Tommy teamed up to take on the fierce Grizzaka while Bridge, Xander, and Will took on Carnisoar. Cam took on Jellica alone, switching into 'Super Samurai Mode'.

The remaining Greens (and Black) took on the remaining Rin Shi. Soon the three Overlords backed off, leading Zack to suggest a dance party. In response Tommy did a face-palm- well more of a visor-palm as they were all still morphed.

…

Mora, Nayzor, and Goldar were wreaking havoc in the Briarwood Park along with their Krybot, Putrid, and Putty minions. Kimberly suggested, "All right, let's go in reverse order. Rose, you're up."

Rose nodded, stepping forward. "Overdrive Accelerate! Pink Overdrive Ranger!"

Vida went next, saying, "Magical Source, Mystic Force! Ever-changing as the wind! Pink Mystic Ranger!"

Third was Syd, who shouted: "SPD Emergency! SPD Pink Ranger!"

"Time for Time Force! Pink Time Force Ranger!" called out Jen.

Already at the halfway point Dana stated, "Lightspeed Rescue! Pink Lightspeed Ranger!"

Kendrix said, "Go Galactic! Pink Galaxy Ranger!"

"Let's Rocket! Pink Space Ranger!" shouted out Cassie.

Katherine shouted, "Shift into Turbo! Pink Turbo Ranger!

Karone stated, "It's morphing time! Zeo Ranger 1 Pink!"

"Pterodactyl! Pink Power Ranger!" Kimberly finished up the morphing, almost immediately bringing out her Power Weapon- "Power Bow!"

The ten Pink Rangers charged into battle, the other nine calling out their own weapons.

"Zeo Pistol!" shouted out Karone, that being the only weapon she was aware of (plus it sounded like something she could handle). She started to blast away at some Putties.

"Turbo Sword!" yelled Kat, enjoying the sensation of being morphed again. She decided to tackle Nayzor while Kimberly shot arrow after arrow at Krybots.

"Satellite Stunner!" called out Cassie, immediately coming to Karone's aid- not that the former villain needed any but Cassie had been a Ranger under her brother's team.

"Transdagger! Beta Bow!" Kendrix got out her weapon.

"Rescue Injector!" Dana got her weapon, using it on Putrids.

"Chrono Saber!" shouted Jen, charging towards Goldar, engaging in a sword duel with him.

"Deltamax Striker!" Syd got out her weapon to help Dana.

"Magi Staff- Wand Mode!" Vida called up a wind to blow away some Putties, freeing Cassie and Karone to battle the illusion-creating Mora.

"Drive Geyser!" Rose shouted, using the Geyser to wash away some Krybots. The Pink Rangers kept fighting, quickly gaining the upper hand so that Mora teleported herself and her two allies away. So the Pinks just finished off the remaining minions before demorphing.

…

Near the lake in Turtle Cove stood Jinxor as well as the brothers Moltor and Flurious. A near army of Batlings, Chillers, and Lava Lizards were at the ready. Considering how many odd-colored Rangers there were this was a good thing.

Zhane smiled lopsidedly. "All right, let's do this!"

"Let's Rocket! Silver Space Ranger!"

"Magna Power! Magna Defender!" shouted Mike.

"Titanium Power! Titanium Ranger!" Ryan called out.

"Wild Access!" Alyssa morphed into the- "Noble Tiger!"

"Wild Access! Howling Wolf!" Merrick shouted.

Trent morphed, shouting, "Dino Thunder, Power Up! White Dino Ranger!"

"SPD Emergency! Defender of the Galaxy, SPD Shadow Ranger!" barked out Doggie.

"SPD Emergency! Force from the Future, SPD Omega Ranger!" cried out Sam.

"SPD Emergency! Kat Ranger!" declared Kat Manx.

"SPD Emergency! Nova Ranger!" Nova stated seconds later.

"Magical Source, Mystic Force! Fluffy of snow! White Mystic Ranger!" Udonna cried out.

"Magical Source, Mystic Force! Power of the sun! Solaris Knight!" Daggeron stated.

"Overdrive Accelerate! Mercury Ranger!" said Tyzonn.

"Jungle Beast, Spirit Unleashed! With the courage of the wolf! Violet Jungle Fury Ranger!" RJ shouted.

"Jungle Beast, Spirit Unleashed! With the power of the rhino! White Jungle Fury Ranger!" Dom called out.

Together the twins chorused, "Get in Gear!"

A pair of Chillers exchanged a long, weary look. Even they could tell this wouldn't end well for their side with this many Rangers. And they were right. Doggie and Daggeron took on the two brothers while Dom fought Jinxor; everyone else took on the minions. Swiftly the brothers and Jinxor vanished, leaving the odd assortment of Rangers victorious.

…

Of course, those Chillers didn't know what their Quantron, Cyclobot, and Tyrannodrone brethren in Silver Hills were about to face led by Dark Spector, Frax, and Zeltrax. Jason looked over at Scott.

"Want to alternate between most senior and most junior?"

"Sure," nodded Scott. "I'll go first."

"Get in Gear!"

"Huh… usually we say something after we morph," Jason mused before morphing himself. "Tyrannosaurus! Red Power Ranger!"

"Jungle Beast, Spirit Unleashed! Red Jungle Fury Ranger!" Casey called out.

"Shift into Turbo! Red Turbo Ranger!" TJ declared.

"Overdrive Accelerate! Red Overdrive Ranger!" Mack shouted.

"Let's Rocket! Red Space Ranger!" stated Andros.

"Magical Source, Mystic Force! Burning heart of fire, Wolf Warrior of Truth!" shouted Leanbow.

"Wow, that's epic," Leo approved before morphing himself. "Go Galactic! Red Galaxy Ranger!"

"Magical Source, Mystic Force! Forceful as Fire! Red Mystic Ranger!" proclaimed Nick.

"Lightspeed Rescue! Red Lightspeed Ranger!" Carter shouted.

"SPD Emergency! SPD Red Ranger!" called out Jack.

"Time for Time Force! Red Time Force Ranger!" Wes yelled out.

"Dude, that was a little redundant," Conner observed before shouting out, "Dino Thunder, Power Up! Red Dino Ranger!"

"Quantum Power! Quantum Ranger!" Eric morphed, shooting Conner a glance through his visor, as if daring him to comment. Conner wisely refrained from making any more observations.

"Ninja Storm, Ranger Storm! Power of Air! Red Wind Ranger!" shouted Shane.

"Wild Access! Blazing Lion!" called out Cole.

Lastly Hunter stated, "Thunder Storm, Ranger Storm! Power of Thunder! Crimson Thunder Ranger!"

Dark Spector growled, "Get them!"

Obediently the minions charged forward, the Red Rangers at ready. While Jason took on Zeltrax in Tommy's stead TJ and Andros took on Dark Spector. Wes and Eric teamed up to battle Frax, leaving the other Reds to battle various minions. It took a few minutes, at length Zeltax, Frax, and Dark Spector left the battleground for a safer location.

…

Ivan Ooze himself was in Angel Grove along with Maligore and Imperious. Of course a large quantity of Tenga Warriors, Piranhatrons, Hidiacs, Styxoids, and Grinders were with them. Billy growled, "All right, last chance to back down."

Smiling evilly Ivan replied, "I think not. Earth will at last fall to evil."

All the Blue Rangers looked disbelieving because how many villains before had made that claim? Billy got out his Power Morpher.

"Triceratops! Blue Power Ranger! Power Lance!"

Hurriedly Rocky morphed: "It's morphing time! Zeo Ranger 3 Blue!"

Justin chimed in, "Shift into Turbo! Blue Turbo Ranger!"

"Get in Gear!" Flynn morphed eagerly, followed by a slightly more sedate Theo. "Jungle Beast, Spirit Unleashed! With the stealth of the jaguar! Blue Jungle Fury Ranger!"

"Overdrive Accelerate! Blue Overdrive Ranger!" proclaimed Dax. Madison called out, "Magical Source, Mystic Force! Fluid as the sea! Blue Mystic Ranger!"

"SPD Emergency! SPD Blue Ranger!" declared Sky. Moments later Ethan shouted, "Dino Thunder, Power Up! Blue Dino Ranger!"

"Ninja Storm, Ranger Form! Power of Water! Blue Wind Ranger!" stated Tori. Blake went next, saying, "Thunder Storm, Ranger Form! Power of Thunder! Navy Thunder Ranger!"

"Go Galactic! Blue Galaxy Ranger!" yelled Kai. Chad proclaimed, "Lightspeed Rescue! Blue Lightspeed Ranger!"

"Time for Time Force! Blue Time Force Ranger!" Lucas said firmly. Max went last, shouting out, "Wild Access! Surging Shark!"

"Oo, I'm so scared," Ivan scoffed, eying carelessly the line-up of Rangers. Billy retorted, Power Lance in hand, "Well, let's get you up to speed- we're the Power Rangers and we're not backing down!"

Billy took on Ivan, with Tori and Madison taking on Imperious. Lucas, Ethan, Sky, and Dax teamed up to battle the Hidiacs and Styxoids. Kai, Chad, and Max took on Maligore, using their respective watery powers to cool him off.

Meanwhile the other Blues took on the Tenga Warriors, the Piranhatrons, and the Grinders. An annoyed Ivan backed off when he saw that the odds were weighted in the Rangers' favor. He informed Billy, "This is just the beginning."

"I know," Billy agreed as he demorphed. Ivan and his allies vanished.

…

The various Ranger groups had gone to the 'local' Ranger headquarters, so that the Blues had swarmed the Gym and Juice Bar. Flynn in particular was elated by the presence of such delicious smoothies, being joined by the two female Blues. Kai, Chad, Tori, Sky, and Theo had gone off to the gym section to do some sparring and trade training tips. Justin, Lucas, Max, and Ethan had found the video games, competing to see who could get the highest score. Rocky and Dax had gotten some food to eat.

This left Billy in a corner, sipping a blueberry smoothie. He knew Ivan had spoken the truth- these battles had been just the beginning.

The Reds had gone to the clock tower. Jason was up in the loft, sitting on the windowsill, while the other Reds were down on the ground floor sparring and chatting. Conner came up to stand a few feet behind the original Red Ranger.

"Hey. What's wrong? I mean, we creamed them."

"I think Ivan was just testing us and his new allies," Jason sighed. "Today was a dry run for the real battles."

Conner jammed his hands into his pockets, admitting, "You're right. But I wish you weren't."

"Me too."

Princess Shayla was hosting the oddly colored Rangers (sans Merrick) on the Animarium. Alyssa was tidying up the kitchen in order to make a snack for everyone while everyone else played a game of soccer with the Armadillo Zord as the ball.

At the Rock Porium the other nine Pinks were rocking out to Vida's DJing. Phineas and LeeLee joined in the fun as they were the employees on shift. But at length Kimberly decided to take a breather, stepping out of the building and to the side. Leaning against the… eccentric mural painted on the wall Kim held up her communicator to her mouth.

"Billy?"

Half a minute later his voice came through: "Yes, Kimberly?"

"Just making sure you're okay."

"I'm not a geeky fourteen-year-old anymore, Kim."  
"I know."

"Right…"

"Bye, Billy."

"Farewell, Kimberly."

Letting her arm fall to her side she looked up at the sky.

Most of the Blacks and Greens had been to or heard of the Hartford mansion before, so the 'awe' factor was limited. But now everyone had scattered throughout the mansion and the grounds to explore, play, and generally let off steam. Out front Zack, Tommy, and Adam had crowded into the hammock hung between two trees.

"Man, I've missed this."

"I honestly don't think you're human, Tommy."

"Zack!"

"What, Adam? Tommy doesn't know who his birth parents are and he's had five morphers- and wanting more!"

"Well… if the Power says jump, I'm willing to jump as high as I can."

"Maybe you have a point, Zack."

"Maybe?"

"Okay, you definitely have a point."

"Thank you."

"I'm right between you two- you do realize that, don't you?'

"Yeah," they casually chorused. Tommy just rolled his eyes.

The JKP had shut down for the afternoon so that the Yellow Rangers (plus Fran) could have an epic pizza party. Kira and Z had taken the precaution of locking the cleaning supplies closet and placing a Z clone on guard… just in case. But now everyone was festively making strange pizzas although Lily and Fran had outlawed 'chocolate covered anchovies' to Maya's disappointment.

But in the back of every Ranger's mind was the concern of when and where Ivan would attack next.


	13. Chapter 13: premature finish

**Hello. This is Pink Wolf Princess, explaining that I have gotten in over my head in terms of meshing all eighty-eight Power Rangers in a single fic in less than twelve chapters. Plus I need to work on my battle-writing skills, as repeatedly pointed out. I knew that even before I posted 12; your reviews just confirmed it. :P**

**A more slowly paced reunion fic might show up eventually. Might. It depends.**

**Thanks for reading; maybe someday I'll return to this fic, maybe not. I am sorry.**


End file.
